On October 14, 1976, the Soyuz 23 spacecraft launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in what is now Kazakhstan, carrying cosmonauts Viatcheslav Zudov and Valeri Rojdestvenski. Their mission was to dock with the Salyut-5 space station and carry out scientific and technical tasks as part of the Soviet space program. However, during the final approach, the automatic rendezvous system, named Igla, failed to properly bring Soyuz 23 close to Salyut-5. The crew did not attempt manual control, and with fuel running low, they abandoned the docking attempt. The mission, which was expected to last six days, ended prematurely with an immediate return to Earth. On October 16, 1976, the Soyuz 23 capsule landed in Lake Tengiz, a partially frozen body of water in Kazakhstan, about two kilometers from the shore, during a snowstorm. The parachute, which had become soaked with frozen water, caused the capsule to sink and flip, trapping Zudov and Rojdestvenski inside for nearly ten hours in temperatures of minus twenty-two degrees. The capsule ended up in what became known as an unplanned inhabited landing—the first of its kind in the history of the Soviet space program. Rescue teams struggled to locate the capsule due to fog and extreme cold. Inside the overturned module, the cosmonauts were unable to open the hatch without risking flooding the cabin. After nearly ten hours, ground teams managed to stabilize and bring the capsule back to solid ground, freeing Zudov and Rojdestvenski unharmed. For his composure and courage during the incident, Zudov received the title of Hero of the USSR and the Order of Lenin. The event prompted Soviet engineers to review emergency return protocols. Zudov, the last direct witness of this mission, died on June 12, 2024, at the age of 82.