One... giant leap for mannekind."
For this is our moon-shot. And not many people know this, but the first man to orbit the moon was not Michael Collins but a Russian mannekin accompanied by two tortoises. The latter were dissected upon return to Earth to see how well they had survived travelling a half-million miles through space. Very well, apparently, or at least until the dissection.
In ways that Neil Armstrong was to benefit from turns of fortune in being the final selection for commanding the first lunar landing, the mannekin here passed the albeit more hurried selection by dint of the fact that our engineer's wife had run out of the 1.20 metre models. The one here therefore represents say a five-year-old child rather than a seven-year-old.
The mannekin commented at the press-conference: "I'm delighted to have been selected for the UK's effort to get people airborne in a flying phone-box and although my own piloting skills will not be called upon as were Neil Armstrong's when 3000 feet above the lunar surface, I have every confidence in the automatics."
And with this he/she was escorted off the podium in order to get suited and booted.
