DIY Halowe'en: Laika come home

In the ever-expanding Boing Boing DIY Hallowe'en Costume thread, an anonymous Boing Boing reader points us to this wonderful Sputnik 2 and Laika costume by vietnamted. Alternate view here.

• [jacques45]

  I’ve been mostly ignoring the stuff about the costumes, but that one just commandeers my attention. Nice job.

• [Anonymous]

  Thanks!

• [jaytkay]

  I cry whenever I hear her story. No kidding, no irony. Here’s to you, Laika, unwitting hero of the space age. Sorry we did that to you, girl.

• [AnneH]

  Given the rather sad story that inspired this costume – Laika was the first living thing sent into space, and the Soviets sent her to die in orbit, because they had no plan to recover her alive – I find the concept very sweet and touching.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika

  • [Kosmoid]

    ITA. This is such a downer that they sent the dog up there to die. Why?

    I have to give props for originality, though.

    But, hey, you got the dog there, it’ll attract chicks, then you have your head hidden in a nose cone? And howya gonna hold a drink?

    • [Anonymous]

      I’m married. There’s a lot of room in there for drinks. I could probably even balance the drink on top of the container my dog goes in.

      We will see.

    • [vietnamted]

      I’m married. There is however a lot of room in there for me to hold a drink.

• [technogeek]

  Folks, dogs have been used in medical research for a very long time. They’re a good model for some aspects of human biology, and they’re relatively easy to work with. I’m afraid you’re just going to have to get used to the idea that some animals are pets, some are food, some are workers, some are research subjects… and a single species may be used for more than one of those categories. (Heck, a single individual sometimes migrates from one category to the other; ask someone who grew up on a farm…)

  Remember the state of rocketry at the time. The purpose of this trip was to find out whether they could get a living thing larger than a mouse into orbit without killing it on the way up or having it die rapidly when removed from gravity and atmosphere. Bringing it back alive would be a subsequent step.

  And before you get too bent out of shape about us doing things to animals that we wouldn’t do to ourselves, remember that we did put humans into space before it was clear that this was survivable.

  • [AnneH]

    It is possible to recognize the necessity of Laika’s death, and be saddened by it at the same time. She was of little importance, as a stray dog, before the Soviets used her. Her death made her life valuable. Such is life.

  • [Kosmoid]

    If Wikipedia is accurate about this, the US started launching rhesus monkeys in 1948. The first one died in flight due to suffocation.

    While animation experimentation for space programs might have been justifiable, it’s not wrong to feel some compassion.

    • [Kosmoid]

      animation = animal

• [Anonymous]

  Laika, I will never forget you.

• [jonathan levy]

  awesome!

• [rotundo]

  This one made me really sad… Great that she’s still being remembered. Rest in peace, little space dog.

• [Hagrid]

  Poor Laika, sent to die in orbit…

• [Dragonflye]

  Controversial or not, this costume made me laugh really hard.

• [Anonymous]

  Is that a Laika in your rocket, or are you just happy to see me?

• [Kosmoid]

  I’m still miffed about this dog dying. But really, traditionally All Hallows Eve was about a festival for the dead.

  Why couldn’t the Soviets send up a creature that people wouldn’t care if it didn’t survive re-entry? Like maybe a lobster.

  This would have had the added benefit of thoroughly confusing the American intelligence community, not to mention the person who found this capsule if it went off course. Worldwide headline: “Crustacean-like Creature from Outer Space Crash Lands in Kansas Cornfield.”