Big honking heat shield

[Mark de Vries]

Alpha_Geek said:
I didn't do much research to see if the Sovs actually got to try a reentry at that speed, though.

Here's a quote from the above-metioned page, concerning Zond 7:

Circumlunar flight; successfully recovered in USSR August 13, 1969. Only completely successful L1 flight that could have returned cosmonauts alive or uninjured to earth. Official mission was further studies of the moon and circumlunar space, to obtain colour photography of the earth and the moon from varying distances, and to flight test the spacecraft systems. Earth photos were obtained on August 9, 1969. On August 11, 1969, the spacecraft flew past the moon at a distance of 1984.6 km and conducted two picture taking sessions. Successfully accomplished double-dip re-entry and landed 50 km from aim point near Kustani in the USSR.

It mentions a double-dip reentry. Would that perhaps mean that before the proper reentry, the capsule was slowed down by aerobraking? At a slower speed, the bell-shape of the capsule would pose fewer problems.