[3][4] Due to a problem with the rocket which launched it, it did not depart low Earth orbit,[5] and it decayed several days later.

[2] The spacecraft was launched at 15:35:15 UTC on 4 November 1962, atop a Molniya 8K78 carrier rocket flying from Site 1/5 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

[1] About 260 seconds into the flight, the oxidiser pressurisation system malfunctioned, resulting in cavitation within the feed lines and turbopump.

This prevented the Blok L upper stage igniting, leaving the spacecraft in its parking orbit.

[7] The designations Sputnik 31, and later Sputnik 24, were used by the United States Naval Space Command to identify the spacecraft in its Satellite Situation Summary documents, since the Soviet Union did not release the internal designations of its spacecraft at that time, and had not assigned it an official name due to its failure to depart geocentric orbit.