Sheep & Space Travel
Long before even the first airplane was invented by the Wright Brothers, people wanted to know if humans could potentially withstand high altitudes. This led to an experiment in 1783, where an unmanned hot air balloon took off into the sky with only a group of animals. A duck (used to high altitudes), a rooster (flightless bird), and finally a sheep were all added to this balloon ride. This is where one sheep named Montauciel became one of the animals that inspired scientists. The idea of this experiment was that if a normal land animal like a sheep could handle these high altitudes, so could humans. Thankfully, the sheep came back perfectly fine. Which inspired scientists for decades to come regarding the idea of flying or going into space. Without this sheep, where might we be today?