Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index The Cosmos 60 probe, launched by the Soviet Union on March 12 1965, was intended to be a lunar soft-landing mission, with a design similar to that of Luna 4. The spacecraft achieved Earth orbit but failed to leave orbit for its journey to the Moon for unknown reasons, and was designated Cosmos 60. It had an on-orbit mass of 6530 kg. Beginning in 1962, the name Cosmos was given to Soviet spacecraft which remained in Earth orbit, regardless of whether that was their intended final destination. The designation of this mission as an intended planetary probe is based on evidence from Soviet and non-Soviet sources and historical documents. Typically Soviet planetary missions were initially put into an Earth parking orbit as a launch platform with a rocket engine and attached probe. The probes were then launched toward their targets with an engine burn with a duration of roughly 4 minutes. If the engine misfired or the burn was not completed, the probes would be left in Earth orbit and given a Cosmos designation. This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.