Inktober 52 - Week 45 - ‘Satellite’
“Laika, sweet loyal Laika, How happy have you made the scientists all around the world! The faint beating of your heart, fluttering from a thousand-kilometre altitude, to them has drowned out all other sounds…”
From ‘Tyapa, Borka and the rocket’ (1962)
Satellite brings to mind Laika, Mushka, Pchyolka and all the other dogs that sadly perished in that race to space. Best research suggests that between 1951 and 1966 some 20 dogs died in the pursuit of space travel. Laika, Mushka and Pchyolka are particularly sad as they died in not so accidental circumstances. While other dogs died with unintentional launch explosions or parachute failures; Laika never had a system to bring her back to earth (due to time constraints, but she died shortly after launch due to stress and overheating anyhow). And Mushka and Pchyolka died due to a self-destruct system in the capsule to prevent soviet secrets being stolen. Some reports say the self-destruct went off on purpose, some say accidental. We may never know.
In many ways I wish we were further along in our understanding use in our space knowledge then we are today. Just to make these tragic stories seem more worth it. We’ve come a long way, but not far enough. At least Laika is well celebrated in pop culture and I hope she remains so. But I’d love for the other names to also be remembered more often.
dailybridgerton
2087
jacobvanloon
gummygunk
stormborns
turnnoffyourmind
romaincrisis
kianamaiart
izzy806
