Study of Venera Spacecraft Trajectories and Wider Implications
Adam Hibberd

TL;DR
This study investigates the trajectories of Venera spacecraft and similar objects, analyzing their orbital properties to determine if some space probes could be mistaken for natural objects like asteroids or comets.
Contribution
The paper introduces a method using the Earth Tisserand parameter to identify potential Venera probes among near-Earth objects, linking specific dark comets to space missions.
Findings
Dark Comets have an Earth Tisserand parameter close to 3, similar to Venera probes.
Certain Dark Comets are associated with specific Venera missions, notably $2010 ext{VL}_{65}$ with Venera-12.
Probability of these associations occurring by chance is extremely small.
Abstract
Historically, there is no doubt that the early years of the USSR space program put them way ahead of the competition (the USA). Nonetheless, although this was not what the Russians wished to present to the world, the interplanetary campaign, centred around missions to the planet Venus (the Venera program) was also beset with difficulties. Many of the early Venera probes failed, despite making it to a heliocentric orbit, but naturally the success rate improved with time. The result is that there are now many Venera probes in heliocentric orbits, either completely intact, or the main bus after a successful deployment of the lander; together with the associated Blok-L upper stages. This paper is a response to some previous quite contentious research proposing that a certain member of a new class of objects, designated may in fact be the Venera-2 probe. In this paper we look…
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Taxonomy
TopicsSpacecraft Dynamics and Control · Astro and Planetary Science · Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life
