1.
LV.INT.Press conference room.
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2.
SV.PAN.The two monkeys.
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3.
CU. The Rhesus monkey.
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4.
SCU. The Squirrel monkey.
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Initials ANH/MR/CW



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: Visnews filmed May 30 as the two female monkeys, 'Able' and 'Baker', fit after a fifteen-minute journey into space two days earlier, posed for cameramen at a press conference in the crowded Washington head quarters of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Hordes of cameramen and reporters crowded the stuffy auditorium to hear Dr.T. Keith Glennan, Administrator of the N.A.S.A. declare that the flight and resulting press conference was in no way a "stunt".

'Able', a light-brown 7-1b American-born Rhesus, wore the imperturbable look of a veteran traveller, while tiny Baker, a 1-1b yellowish squirrel was temperamental and lively. Both were said to be in "excellent shape" after their 1,500 mile space journey and landing in the Atlantic 1,700 miles from the launching pad at Cape Canaveral.

'Baker' wore bandages round her body where electrodes had been connected for scientific experiments. She had a small scar on her eye caused by scrambling from one cage to another.

Mr. Donald Stillken, a Navy physiologist who took the monkeys from the nose cone, said both were in better condition then they had been during the 24-hour test runs in the laboratory. Physiological changes had been small and irregularities only occurred during re-entry of capsule into a atmosphere.

After the press conference the monkeys went to a military medical centre for observation and a rest.