After Elon Musk, Russian scientists send toy car to space

Last year, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk launched a sports car up in space for the first time. Now mocking Musk, Russians have sent up their own car in space, but a toy one instead.

Musk launched a cherry-red Tesla Roadster into space aboard its Falcon Heavy rocket last year in February. Following suit, Russian scientists from Tomsk State University’s ToSky Project have sent their own red toy car into space.

However, the car is not just any toy car. It was a replica of the red Zhiguli which was owned by Dmitry Rogozin, who serves as the director-general of Russia’s Roscosmos space agency, reported Futurism. Also, along with the car, the team put up a tiny cutout of Rogozin in the driver’s seat too.

Video Courtesy: ToSky Project/YouTube

The car was sent about 150km into the atmosphere via an automatic stratosat at 80km per hour. However, unlike Musk’s car, the Russian scientists’ car replica safely returned back to Earth, landing after about 16 hours of flight and on an estimated 2,000km away from the original launch site, wrote The Moscow Times.