In the early hours of 3 November liftoff finally occurred, but there were immediate problems. While in Sputnik 2 Laika could stand, sit and lie down, she would be unable to turn around. Laika was placed in the satellite on 31 October 1957 and was fitted with a harness and chains that would control her movement. Laika was trained to eat a special gel high in nutrition that would serve as her food during her flight and was also placed in machines that stimulated the noise and acceleration she would experience during launch. Over their training they were enclosed in progressively smaller cages to prepare them for the confines of the spacecraft. Laika and the other dogs embarked on an intensive period of training before the much-anticipated flight. Laika was not the first dog that was to be sent into the sky, both the US and the Soviet Union had sent animals into sub-orbital flight, and two other dogs – Mushka and Albina were also trained for the Sputnik 2 launch. Vladimir Yazdovsky, who prepared Laika for her flight, described her as “quiet and charming.” Laika stood out from other dogs as she had a calm temperament and small size, weighing about five kilograms (11 pounds). Laika had spent her life as a stray on the streets of Moscow, and stray dogs had already been adopted by the space mission due to their ‘scrappy’ natures and ability to withstand extreme temperatures and hunger. It came in the most unlikely of packages – a three-year-old dog named Laika. The 40th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution on 7 November provided the perfect opportunity for another successful Soviet launch, and Khrushchev demanded a “space spectacular” to stun the world. After the success of Sputnik 1, the first artificial Earth satellite, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was keen to instate Soviet domination of space. The year was 1957 and the Space Race between the Soviet Union and the United States was just starting to gain speed. Laika had several nicknames before they settled on her name.
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