Sadly, Able died a few days later during surgery to remove an infected electrode.
Able was preserved after her death and is currently on display inside her cradle at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.
How does an electrode get infected? Isn't that like saying your computer got infected with a physical virus? Oh dear gods ... she had the spaaaace sicknesssss. And to add insult to injury, her space-coffin cradle became her earth coffin.
Space Monkey, Space Monkey
What you doing out there?
Why it's dark as a dungeon way up in the air
Come gather round me you little monkeys and a story I'll tell
About a brave young primate, outer space knew him well
He was born at the top of a big old tree
Way back in 1953.
He could swing through the jungle and hang by his toes
Till they took him to Russia cause they could I suppose
They dressed him up in a spacesuit and it started to snow
Shot him off in a rocket where no man would go
Space Monkey Space Monkey
What you doing out there?
Why it's dark as a dungeon way up in the air
There'll be no one to greet you when you get back home
No hammer or sickle you'll be on your own.
He had plenty of Cuban bananas and loads of Spam
But he found great difficulty trying to open the can
One day he slipped on a banana peel and the ship lost control
It spun out of orbit and shot out the black hole
It's been four decades now, that's nine monkey years
That's a long time for a Space Monkey to confront all his fears
Space Monkey Space Monkey
What you doing out there?
Why it's dark as a dungeon way up in the air
There'll be no one to greet you when you get back home
No hammer or sickle you'll be all on your own.
Space Monkey, Space Monkey
It's time to get real
The space race is over, how does it feel
Cold War's had a heatwave, Iron Curtain's torn down
They've rolled up the carpet in Space Monkey town
Now Leningrad is Petersburg and Petersburg's hell
For a card-carrying monkey with a story to tell
The Space Monkey was reportedly last sighted about
A half a block off of Red Square
In a karaoke bar having a few drinks with some of his friends
There was the dog that flew Sputnik
And a blind red-headed, one legged parrot
Who had done some minor research for Dow Chemical
They were drinking American Vodka
Imported all the way from Paducah, Kentucky
And reportedly had their arms around each other's
Shoulders singing.
"Those were the days, my friend, we thought they'd never end"
Space Monkey, Space Monkey
There's nothing to do
But it's better than living in a Communist zoo
There'll be no one to greet you when you get back home
No hammer or sickle you'll be all on you own posted by netbros at 9:18 PM on June 2 [1 favorite has favorites]
In addition to monkeys, animals that have gone into space in the name of science include dogs, cats, fruit flies, rabbits, turtles, spiders, jellyfish, and amoebas.
I hope the spiders and jellyfish were not on human flights, or at least were triple-secured.
I, for one, can't wait for all the great-great-great grandchildren to return from space, to signal the beginning of a beautiful new era of space-monkey-jellyspider goodness. posted by rokusan at 12:38 AM on June 3
Is this not some sort of late return to Monkey News?
I presume all the spacecraft in which these monkeys travelled were outfitted with banana dispensers. posted by greycap at 2:12 AM on June 3
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posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:39 PM on June 2