NEWS · B2 Level - Part 7

On this day August 19

...and today is August 19th. So, let's start off with a "On This Day In History", man's best friend helped change the space race forever.

Level: B2 · 17 sentences

Transcript

  1. ...and today is August 19th.
  2. So, let's start off with a "On This Day In History", man's best friend helped change the space race forever.
  3. On August 19th, 1960,
  4. two K9 cosmonauts named Belka and Strelka blasted off aboard the Soviet spacecraft Sputnik 5,
  5. becoming the first dogs to orbit Earth and make it home alive.
  6. And they weren't flying solo.
  7. Along for the ride, a rabbit, rats, dozens of mice, and assorted plants and fungi.
  8. Basically Noah's Ark space edition.
  9. They orbited the Earth 17 times, spending more than a day in space.
  10. The pups followed Laika, a Soviet dog who became the first living creature to be sent into space in 1957,
  11. but sadly did not survive.
  12. Belka and Strelka, Russian for squirrel and little arrow,
  13. became instant folk heroes back home
  14. and threw the US Soviet space race into overdrive.
  15. Just nine months later, Russia's Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space.
  16. Less than a decade later, in 1969, the US landed on the moon as part of the Apollo 11 mission.
  17. So before humans took one giant leap, a couple of very good girls took some pretty important first steps.