WI: Korabl-Sputnik 1 kills someone in Wisconsin, 1962?

[Thande]

Whilst reading about the Soviet Vostok Programme (which would put Yuri Gagarin into space in 1961) I read about the unmanned test flight Korabl-Sputnik 1 (aka Sputnik 4 in the West). Launched in 1960, due to a problem with its guidance system, after a successful launch the spacecraft entered to the wrong orbit and eventually re-entered the atmosphere on September 5th, 1962. A red-hot 20 lb fragment survived atmospheric re-entry and impacted on North 8th Street, Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Nobody was hurt, the site was discovered by police officers and a cast was made before the Soviets claimed it.

Of course, the re-entry or the movement of people could easily have been slightly different, and it's possible that the impact could have killed someone. Given that this was only weeks before the Cuban Missile Crisis blew up, what might the consequences have been? Would the Soviets have refused to claim the fragment as theirs and the Americans attempted to prove it? Would this have poured fuel on the flames of the missile crisis?

Discuss.

 

[Yokai Man]

A) The Soviets apologize,things get solved before the Cuban Crisis happens and it’s forgotten after a while.
B) The problem escalates tensions between the Yanks and the Soviets,but not to the brink of war,it being forgotten after the Cuban Crisis.

I do find hard to see either side be willing to go to war over it.It mostly just becomes a forgotten incident of the Space Race and of the Cold War.

 

[Archibald]

nice little whatif. Will think about possible consequences.

 

[Thande]

A) The Soviets apologize,things get solved before the Cuban Crisis happens and it’s forgotten after a while.
B) The problem escalates tensions between the Yanks and the Soviets,but not to the brink of war,it being forgotten after the Cuban Crisis.

I do find hard to see either side be willing to go to war over it.It mostly just becomes a forgotten incident of the Space Race and of the Cold War.

It obviously wouldn't start a war in and of itself, but I wonder if it might have an impact on the tensions of the Crisis.

 

[Archibald]

I checked wiki cuban crisis and by september tensions were already boiling up.
Have the Sputnik fall on Cuba or better on the tip of Florida.

 

[zaffre]

Amusing though it would be for the Soviets to bluff about their Fully Armed And Operational Battle Station, I think the most likely tack is for the Soviets to admit the fragment was theirs and then whine about how the Americans are pinning an unrelated death on it to discredit glorious Soviet science.

I think this is weirdly more likely to have a cultural impact than a military / political one - I doubt it changes the trajectory of the Cuban Missile Crisis enough to cause war, but deadly space satellites are the sort of thing that would make pretty big ripples in the somewhat small pond of 60s sci-fi.

 

[Arthur_Phuxache]

PRAVDA DENIES EVERYTHING.

 

[Simon]

A red-hot 20 lb fragment survived atmospheric re-entry and impacted on North 8th Street, Manitowoc, Wisconsin.

Huh. I'd never heard of Manitowoc before the other week when I learnt about the city due to the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company and how it built submarines during WWII which were sailed down Lake Michigan, through Chicago and along the Illinois River, then loaded onto floating dry-docks until they reached New Orleans, and now you post this about it. One of those odd coincidences.