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Vintage Soviet Space Capsule Sold For Record $2.9M
abednegoyulo writes "A vintage Vostok space capsule is headed back to its homeland with its new Russian owner, who bought the relic of the early days of human spaceflight for nearly $2.9 million during Sotheby's auction Tuesday. 'It surpasses Sotheby's own sale in 1996 of a more modern Russian Soyuz capsule for $1.6 million,' Pearlman added. 'That spacecraft, purchased by Ross Perot's foundation, is now on loan and displayed at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.'" Best treehouse ever.
I just hope this doesn't give Washington any ideas. With all this budget cutting, I would hate to think of it occurring to someone that the Smithsonian's collection would do really well at auction.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Maybe Texas can make a deal with New York and trade it for the Enterprise. Houston should have gotten one of the Shuttles. They where the third most deserving location after the Smithsonian and KSC. Even if the only reason that Mission Control and astronaut training is there is because the SOB LBJ stole it from the Cape.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Meh. Write your own damn joke!
In C++, your friends can see your privates.
Summary is misleading. I was confused till I read the article. I thought Ross Perot's foundation bought it for $1.6m. I didn't realize it was a Russian that bought it for 2.9 million until I RTFA.
Is it just me, or do you hate it when people say "Is it just me..."?
and their friends' friends, & families' spys..... just another feature. for some odd reason, they do get extra (ducats, virgins etc...) for spying on/reporting innocent nonsense, & continually attempting to distort the truth, while spying on each other at the same time. god help them.
For $ 2.9 million I want the whole rocket ... fully tanked ... and Bam Margera to graffiti "Mars or bust!" on the capsule. And Johnny Knoxville as the co-pilot.
"Hi, I'm Johnny Knoxville, and this is our mission to Mars. Or, we're fucked ..."
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
I'm acutally surprised how that the price tag for something like this is so low. Also, I wonder where it has been. TFA says they buyer will be returning it to Russia, and hopes to put it in a museum. So where has it been and how did it fall into private hands? TFA doesn't say anythign about that. But I bet the answer is a dirty, dirty story.
Light cup, beer drink, thin so chain, neck turtle fat, man I won't say it again
Do US export laws permit the transfer of space technology to Russia?
...are snatching up whatever space vehicles they can. I hear there's gonna be a shortage. Change the tubes in the radio, slap a coat of paint on it, and you can sell the US government seats to the space station. They're not going to get there any OTHER way. Sellers market...
In a fiery death no less?
Where is the donation button for that fine endeavor?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I hear the problem was that it developed a hole in the outer hull, and the giant sucking sound was too much for him.
I am officially gone from
It's quite the nifty souvenir, but considering that it's been totally stripped of its equipment, you're just getting an empty diving bell that went to space. For 2.9 million I'd expect to be able to see the equipment that was used back then as well, see how cramped it really was and so on.
~Syberz
Of course it's expensive, it's vintage!
From TFA: The Vostok 3KA-2 space capsule launched into space 20 days before Gagarin's historic first human spaceflight aboard the Vostok 1 spacecraft. The unmanned Vostok 3KA-2 capsule carried a life-size mannequin nicknamed Ivan Ivanovich and a dog called Zvezdochka ("Little Star" in Russian).