Some of these stressors included loud noises, changes in air pressure, and cramped or confined spaces. They exposed the dogs to the various stressors they might experience in the shuttle to see which dogs adapted the best to the stressors and which could not handle them.
After rounding up and bringing in around 50 candidates, the scientists began to narrow them down based on temperament. Female dogs are normally smaller and more passive, making for a perfect weight and a better temperament. When looking for a dog to fit the specifications for this mission, the Soviet Union scoured the streets of Moscow for small, female, stray dogs. For the first low Earth orbit flight, it was imperative that the Soviet Union had a dog that was the correct size and weight, as they did not have the jet or fuel technology to launch very much weight. Low Earth orbit is about where the ISS orbits now, and is around 225 miles above the Earth’s surface. What makes Laika different is not that she was the first or the last, but that she was the first dog to be launched into low Earth orbit. The two were titled “the world’s first dogmonauts”.Īfter Tsygan and Dezik came lots of other dog pairs, all of which were sent into suborbital flight patterns in the same way. The pair of dogs landed safely, were recovered successfully from the spacecraft, and Tsygan was adopted by a physicist who worked on the project.
A suborbital flight is about 62 miles above the Earth’s surface. They were launched into a sub orbital flight pattern, meaning that they did not reach “past” the earth’s atmosphere and did not go high enough to orbit the Earth. In terms of the Soviet Union’s space dogs, however, the first pair to be sent to space were two dogs named Tsygan and Dezik in 1951. The first animals in space were actually fruit flies, not dogs or monkeys. When JFK addressed the nation in 1961, the race itself became quantifiable as a competition to see which country could put a man on the Moon.īefore human spaceflight could be possible or even attempted, however, scientists in both countries had to test their spacecraft and life support systems with animal subjects.
The Space Race has historically been one of the only times in American history when NASA was funded and average people were excited and informed about the endeavors of our space program. While many of the competitions-made-altercations in the Cold War were to demonstrate prowess in ideological, political, or military power, the Space Race was unique in that it mainly sought to demonstrate technological power. This led to events like the Vietnam War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the Space Race. I work at the National Air and Space Museum, and here is my telling of the Soviet space dogs’ stories.ĭuring the Cold War, America and the Soviet Union were pitted against one another on a global stage to outperform one another in every arena possible. When telling her story, however, there tends to be a lot of other dogs left out of the story, both before and after her mission in Sputnik II. A lot of people have heard of Laika, the famous Soviet space dog whose death has sparked the telling and retelling of her story as a tragic example of using animals in scientific endeavors.
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