Beaver Beaver friend GTK wrote this week about the sad story of a freetail bat with a broken wing making the incredibly bad decision to rest on the space shuttle before its launch. NASA reported uncolorfully that it had “Likely perished during the shuttles climb into orbit”.
Blogger John Herrman at Gizmodo offered a much more fitting description:
Bereft of his ability to fly and with nowhere to go, a courageous bat climbed aboard our Discovery with stars in his weak little eyes. The launch commenced, and Spacebat trembled as his frail mammalian body was gently pushed skyward. For the last time, he felt the primal joy of flight; for the first, the indescribable feeling of ascending toward his dream—a place far away from piercing screeches and crowded caves, stretching forever into fathomless blackness.
Whether he was consumed in the exhaust flames or frozen solid in the stratosphere is of no concern. We know that Spacebat died, but his dream will live on in all of us.
Now if you don’t think the story of a space bound bat has captured the fancies of America, check out the web traffic. There are literally hundreds of movies about this on Youtube. Here is a prime contender from RavenCK:
[youtube:http://youtube.com/watch?v=Ibq2IwznCgc]
