Many historic flights lifted off from Baikonur: the first operational ICBM; the first man-made satellite, Sputnik 1, on 4 October 1957; the first spacecraft to travel close to the Moon, Luna 1, on 2 January 1959; the first crewed and orbital flight by Yuri Gagarin on 12 April 1961; and the flight of the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova, in 1963. 14 cosmonauts of 13 other nations, including Czechoslovakia, East Germany, India and France have launched from Baikonur under the Interkosmos program as well. In 1960, a prototype R-16 ICBM exploded before launch, killing over 100 people. Baikonur is also the site from which Venera 9 and Mars 3 were launched.
