The Archives

摘要

1959 Newsweek reported on the latest U.S. achievements and setbacks in the space race: on May 28, two monkeys-Able and Baker-were launched into space and returned to Earth healthy and unharmed. These were the first U.S. animals to survive an extra-terrestrial journey. Scientists were still unsure if living creatures could survive long periods of weightlessness. Therefore, NASA launched black mice aboard the Discoverer 3 satellite several days later. They were supposed to orbit Earth for four days, but a technical malfunction caused the rockets to steer the satellite into the Pacific Ocean.