Spacesuit goes overboard for unusual mission

James Oberg NBC News space analyst

HOUSTON - It sounds like a scene from science fiction: A lone figure is cast off from the space station, getting smaller and smaller as it drifts out into empty space.

In this case, however, no human will actually be at risk. When the crew members aboard the international space station toss a worn-out spacesuit over the side, it will be empty except for an interesting amateur radio experiment.

During a spacewalk scheduled this Friday, astronaut Bill McArthur and cosmonaut Valery Tokarev will spend six hours carrying out assembly, repair and inspection work on the space station — and one photogenic feat of "space littering."

It won't be the first time an old Russian spacesuit has been tossed overboard, but "SuitSat," as it is called, has an actual mission.

A simple battery-powered radio transmitter inside the suit will use an antenna mounted to the suit's helmet to send signals down to Earth for up to several days. The data will include temperature readings, a slow-scan TV image and several specially coded messages for ham radio listeners to figure out.

The project is aimed mainly at students, and SuitSat organizers solicited hundreds of school pictures, artwork, poems and signatures from schools all over the world. A CD with the imagery is being placed inside Suitsat, with another copy of it to be kept on the space station.

SuitSat's transmitting career will be short, however: Its batteries are expected to run out after several days. Within a few weeks, SuitSat itself will burn up in the atmosphere.

SuitSat’s ancestors
Russia's spacesuits are excellent for working outdoors in orbit. From a spacewalker's perspective, they're flexible, easy to don and doff, and have excellent visibility, including a porthole in the top of the helmet for looking directly overhead. They're also easy to service and, more so than NASA's spacesuits, are designed for repairs in the field.

NASA The old Russian Orlan spacesuit is outfitted with a special radio transmitter and other gear.

Still, such suits have a limited life — usually about 10 to 12 spacewalks. The equipment installed on the suits can be cannibalized for use on newer suits, but the bulky main shells must be disposed of. Sometimes they are stuffed into empty supply drones destined to dive back into the atmosphere. Once, a suit was loaded onto a visiting space shuttle for study back on Earth. But usually, the suits  are literally thrown away into space, stuffed with other throwaway items such as empty food containers and dirty clothing.

In October 1993, two cosmonauts aboard the Russian space station Mir added a wry visual gimmick: They stuffed the suit full of trash, shaping it into the posture of a cosmonaut standing erect, arm waving goodbye. They then cast it off in full view of their external television camera. As it slowly cartwheeled away, the empty suit looked like that classic science-fiction staple of the doomed astronaut, saluting as it went to a fiery Viking funeral in Earth’s atmosphere.

For years afterwards, cosmonauts entertained guest astronauts by playing a tape of the spacesuit’s final salute. The images were never released to the public — perhaps for fear they could spark sensational rumors. But in 1993 Russia was still using communications relay satellites for television transmissions, and a few dedicated and highly skilled radio amateurs in Europe were able to eavesdrop on the channel and capture the image.

How to tune in to SuitSat
For decades, American and Russian space activities have included projects on behalf of amateur radio operators all around the world. SuitSat — whose "call sign" will be "RS0RS" — will broadcast on a frequency deliberately chosen to be easily accessible.

"All you need is an antenna — the bigger the better — and a radio receiver that you can tune to 145.990 MHz FM," said project engineer Frank Bauer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "A police band scanner or a hand-talkie ham radio would work just fine."

The satellite will pass across the sky for observers in only a few minutes, so timing is critical.

STATION SPACEWALK SCHEDULE The six-hour spacewalk started at 5:44 p.m. ET Friday, with the SuitSat deployment as the first task. NASA astronaut Bill McArthur and Russian cosmonaut Valery Tokarev also will relocate an adapter for a hand-operated crane, install a safety bolt on a robotic rail car and retrieve a biological experiment from the hull. • Watch live coverage on MSNBC.com MSNBC

For the first few days of its deployment, SuitSat will be in the vicinity of the international space station, so you can use NASA’s online orbital tracking guide or other station-watching sites to keep tabs on SuitSat as well. As SuitSat’s orbit decays, it will gradually drift ahead of the station in its orbital path.

Listeners are asked to log their receptions on the project's home page, SuitSat.org, and to keep up on the project’s progress via the home page of AMSAT, the Radio Amateur Satellite Corp., or through NASA's educational Web site. Updated tracking information will be available from Suitsat.org as well as other sites for skywatchers such as Heavens-Above.com (registration required).

A group known as "SeeSat," which tries to observe space satellites visually, will also try to watch for SuitSat. At best, the small white spacesuit will appear as a dim star — almost too dim for the unaided eye — slowly flashing in the dawn or dusk skies, just ahead of the bright moving dot that is the space station. A group record of the "SeeSat" results, and suggestions for other would-be watchers, can be found on their archive page.

Releasing a radio beacon for amateur radio operators to pick up on is not a new idea. In 1997, cosmonauts aboard Mir tossed a subscale replica of the Sputnik 1 satellite into open space in honor of the 40th anniversary of the original feat. It carried an amateur radio beacon that was heard for weeks.

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