Björn Rust (he/him) is a post-industrial designer, researcher and educator, developing context-sensitive solutions in service of people and the planet.

Recent writings

  1. Place-based innovation for sustainable and resilient human systems
  2. Towards a new political economy for collective well-being through strategic design
  3. Beyond orthodoxy toward design-led economic policy

Animals in Space

reflection

Long before Yuri Gagarin, and the silver suited astronauts of Project Mercury, it was non-human animals that pierced the skies aboard early rockets. First fruit flies and monkeys, then mice and the famous Soviet space dogs.

Most famous among them was a stray from the street of Moscow named Laika, who was sent into orbit aboard Sputnik 2 on the 3rd of November 1957. Laika was regretfully sent to her death, but the Soviets soon developed the technology to de-orbit, and three years later on the 19th of August 1960, Belka and Strelka returned safely to earth after spending a day aboard the Korabl-Sputnik 2.

Meanwhile, in the United States, just months away from Alan Shepard’s space flight, a rhesus monkey named Sam would be sent to the edge of space before crashing into the ocean and being thrown up against the side of a US Navy destroyer. Bob Thompson offers Eric Berger of Ars Technica an unusually colourful recount of Sam’s journey. His story stands as a reminder of the perils of space flight and the incredible bounds we made in the few years during the late 50s and early 60s.

Inspired by: Ars Technica
Reference: Animals in space