The Lost Cosmonauts

Lost Cosmonauts, or Phantom Cosmonauts, is a conspiracy theory alleging that cosmonauts entered outer space, but without their existence having been acknowledged by either the Soviet or Russian space authorities. Proponents of the Lost Cosmonauts theory concede that Yuri Gagarin was the first man to survive space travel, but claim that the Soviet Union attempted to launch two or more manned space flights prior to Gagarin's, and that at least two cosmonauts died in the attempts. 

In 1959 there were stories circulating that the Soviets had lost multiple cosmonauts in attempted suborbital flights. Some of these rumors came from misunderstandings, such as the 1962 death of Colonel Pyotr Dolgov. Dolgov parachuted from a balloon at almost 94,000 feet but didn't survive; he hit the visor of his helmet while jumping from the balloon gondola and his suit de pressurized, killing him.

Mysterious Audio Recording

A pair of young brothers Judica-Cordiglia, claimed to have acquired recordings of several secret Soviet space missions that ended in tragedy and mystery. The brothers said they recorded the voice of a female cosmonaut re-entering the Earth's atmosphere in a malfunctioning spacecraft.

“Come in… come in… come in… Listen! Come in! Talk to me! I am hot! I am hot! Come in! What? Forty-five? What? Fifty? Yes. Yes, yes, breathing. Oxygen, oxygen… I am hot. This… isn’t this dangerous?” 

“Transmission begins now. Forty-one. Yes, I feel hot. I feel hot, it’s all… it’s all hot. I can see a flame! I can see a flame! I can see a flame! Thirty-two… thirty-two. Am I going to crash? Yes, yes I feel hot… I am listening, I feel hot, I will re-enter. I’m hot!”

 Vladimir Shatalov, the Commander of Cosmonaut Training from 1971 to 1987, admitted that "six or eight" trainees had died in the 1960s, but would'say how.The Russian cosmonaut, it seems, had to be perfect or not exist at all. By 1971, nine cosmonauts had vanished from the official photographs which re-released in honour of the 10th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's flight. However, U.S intelligence apparently reports that up to fifteen Russian cosmonauts were killed or lost in space.

James Oberg Footage Evidence

 In a chapter of his 1988 book Uncovering Soviet Disasters: Exploring the Limits of Glasnost entitled "Dead Cosmonauts," space engineer and historian James Oberg relates several episodes:

official photos of the cosmonauts with leaked original copies

• One cosmonaut was airbrushed out of a widely circulated 1961 photo of the original Soviet space team, not  because he'd died in the line of duty but because he'd been cashiered. Again, not until 1986 was the truth  revealed: the missing man was Grigoriy Nelyubov, who along with two other men had been bounced from the cosmonaut corps in late 1961 after fighting with some soldiers in a rail station. Embittered and alcoholic, he was killed in 1966 when he stepped in front of a train.

• On March 23, 1961, three weeks before Gagarin's flight, cosmonaut Valentin Bondarenko died horribly after a fire in an oxygen-rich pressure chamber used for training, which started when he carelessly tossed a cotton pad on a hot plate. Bondarenko's death was not acknowledged until 1986.

• Several other cosmonauts in training were also painted out of photos in books and other materials circulating in the Soviet Union. Most had been dropped from the roster for medical, disciplinary, or academic reasons — the Soviets apparently wanted no suggestion that any cosmonaut was less than perfect.