Disembodied Spacesuit set to orbit Earth

NASA Science News for January 26, 2006

A very strange satellite is about to go into Earth orbit. It's "SuitSat," an empty spacesuit thrown overboard from the International Space Station. Using a simple police scanner or ham radio, you can listen to SuitSat when it orbits over your hometown.

FULL STORY at

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/26....htm?list161084

This is a very odd idea, IMHO!

What will be really interesting is if a voice over the radio starts pleading for help...

Sounds like contraband vodka is still making it onto those Progress cargo ships

They have a space-qualified and tested "device" that is already in Earth orbit. I think it makes a lot of sense to turn an old space suit into a useful satellite. I can see great potential with the concept. An efficient use of resources, which the Russians have had to have a lot of practice with.

It also beats trashing the space suits in Progress return capsules and lends a "noble" way for such an important item aboard the space station to end its final days. Nor should a useful space instrument end up sitting in a museum collecting dust.

More on this 'unmanned' spacecraft at:

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/SuitSat_...February_3.html

Bob shaw

Nifty! Were I a school student, I'd be delighted to partake in SuitSat.

It's the first of more to follow.

Will get kids interested in space exploration. Sometimes the "little things" are more provocative than the "big things" they might otherwise have a difficult time grasping.

A friend has a ham radio set, but it's doubtful he'd lend use of it to my spouse and I.

Stroke of genius if you ask me, I hope some people get recordings of its signal for us to enjoy.

Doug

From the FPSPACE list - some footage of an earlier Orlan suit they ejected into space that was actually set up to wave, and another one showing cosmonauts putting a suit on a "space bike" and releasing it!


Message: 12
Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 21:51:21 +0000
From: Ivan Artner <ivan@wavenet.hu>
Subject: Re: [FPSPACE] Orlan jettison from Mir, 1991-1992??
To: ivan@wavenet.hu
Cc: Jim Oberg <joberg@houston.rr.com>, fpspace@friends-partners.org
Message-ID: <43DBE759.7040407@wavenet.hu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

I found another related video a joke by the same Soyuz-TM17 crew.
jettisoning a small "Soyuz" and a worn cosmonaut overall riding on it.

here is a small realvideo sample, (I'm searching for the original tape
in my archives):

http://xyber.wavenet.hu:8080/mir/real/stm17_56.rm


Message: 20
Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 10:55:56 +0000
From: Ivan Artner <ivan@wavenet.hu>
Subject: Re: [FPSPACE] Orlan jettison from Mir, 1991-1992??
To: ivan@wavenet.hu
Cc: Jim Oberg <joberg@houston.rr.com>, fpspace@friends-partners.org
Message-ID: <43DC9F3C.4000302@wavenet.hu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

mined my tape archives and found the orlan jettison video from october 1993.
sorry, but the quality is very poor as it was downlinked using an odd
television system after the EVA.

http://media.irisz.hu/orlan/1.rm

is 15Mbytes in realvideo format

http://media.irisz.hu/orlan/orlan1.jpg

http://media.irisz.hu/orlan/orlan2.jpg

http://media.irisz.hu/orlan/orlan3.jpg

are 3 tiny still images captured.

On the video file you can listen to the crew commenting on the EVA.

Best Regards: Ivan Artner

The second still is nicely degraded - you can just see Alexei Leonov in it, waving in triumph at the TV camera after leaving LK-1 'Eagle' in Lunar orbit during the EVA back to the LOK mothership, following the first manned landing on the Moon in October 1968 (of course, later flights used the more capable Kretchet suit rather than the Orlan seen here).

(sigh)

Bob Shaw

Space Weather News for Jan. 31, 2006

http://spaceweather.com

SUITSAT: On February 3rd, astronauts plan to hurl an old spacesuit overboard
from the International Space Station. The disembodied suit, nicknamed
"SuitSat," will proceed to circle Earth, transmitting a radio message which
anyone can hear using a police scanner or a ham radio tuned to 145.990 MHz FM.
This strange experiment is a test of a sensible idea--that old spacesuits might
be transformed into useful satellites.

Would you like to listen to SuitSat?

Sign up for Spaceweather PHONE http://spaceweatherphone.com and you'll receive
alerts when the suit is about to orbit over your area.

RELEASE: 06-09

UNUSUAL SATELLITE TRANSMITS VOICES OF MARYLAND STUDENTS WORLDWIDE

Just before 6 p.m. EST this Friday, the crew aboard the International Space Station will deploy an unusual satellite called “SuitSat.” During a planned spacewalk, the two station crew members will release an unmanned Russian spacesuit into space.

This new satellite will transmit the recorded voices of female students from Paint Branch High School and Eastern Middle School in Silver Spring, Md., that anyone with a HAM radio can hear.

"SuitSat is a Russian brainstorm," explains Frank Bauer of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. “Some of our Russian partners in the ISS program had an idea. Maybe we can turn old spacesuits into useful satellites." SuitSat is the first test of that idea.

SuitSat consists of a Russian Orlan spacesuit with three batteries, a radio transmitter and internal sensors to measure temperature and battery power. SuitSat will help scientists determine the durability of spacesuits, the life of the batteries that power the suit, and if a tumbling suit affects the clarity of radio transmissions. It will lay the groundwork for SuitSats of the future.

The Suitsat will transmit one of three types of messages for 30 seconds, pause for 30 seconds, and then repeat.

The transmission begins with "This is SuitSat-1, RS0RS," followed by a prerecorded greeting in six languages. The greeting contains "special words" in English, French, Japanese, Russian, German and Spanish, for students to record and decipher. Awards will be given to students who correctly identify the message. The English-language greetings were recorded by the two Maryland students.

The next message will detail SuitSat's telemetry: temperature, battery power and mission elapsed time. "The telemetry is stated in plain language­in English," says Bauer. "Everyone will be privy to SuitSat's condition. It 'talks' using a voice synthesizer. It's pretty amazing." The transmission ends with a slow scan television picture.

“All you need is an antenna (the bigger the better) and a radio receiver that you can tune to 145.990 MHz FM," Bauer added. "A police scanner or a hand-held ham radio will work just fine."

SuitSat is sponsored by an international working group called Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS). It consists of volunteers from national amateur radio societies and the internationally-based Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT).

For more information about the spacewalk, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/...exp12_eva2.html

For more information about SuitSat, visit:

http://SuitSat.org

or

http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/index.php

Spacesuit goes overboard for unusual mission

Worn-out suit recycled into miniature satellite sending out a radio beacon

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11102068/

By James Oberg, NBC News space analyst // Special to MSNBC

Updated: 2:52 p.m. ET Jan. 31, 2006

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.

THIS SPACESUIT THINKS IT'S A SATELLITE (Space & Astronomy News, 31/1/06)

Three Russian spacesuits are being prepared for a spacewalk at the weekend
from the International Space Station, but only two will be coming back
inside when the planned six-hour excursion is over.

http://abc.net.au/science/news/space/Space...ish_1558727.htm

ARISS Seeks School Involvement in "SuitSat" Project

NEWINGTON, CT, Jun 3, 2005--Plans are on the fast track to deploy a surplus
Russian Orlan spacesuit this fall as a non-traditional satellite. Dubbed
"SuitSat," the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS)
project could become the most unusual Amateur Radio satellite ever orbited.
Now, an ARISS-US proposal will provide an opportunity for schools to
participate in the SuitSat enterprise. To be launched during a spacewalk,
SuitSat will carry an Amateur Radio transmitter that will send voice
greetings to commemorate the 175th anniversary of Russia's Bauman Moscow
State Technical University. Other message possibilities remain under
discussion.

ARISS got permission from the ISS Program Office in May to go
forward with delivery of the SuitSat project, and schools now will have the
chance to take part through what's being called "School Spacewalk." ARISS
International Chairman Frank Bauer, KA3HDO, says the idea is to have schools
around the globe provide a page of artwork that will fly inside SuitSat.

http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2005/06/03/100/

Listen to the radio from an ISS spacesuit

If you were asked what station is currently orbiting 400 km above the Earth at
28 000 km/h you may be tempted to answer the International Space Station (ISS).
This is of course correct but if you were to look with a good telescope behind
the ISS (or tune in with the appropriate equipment) you may soon pick up a
second station: a radio station.

More at:

http://www.esa.int/esaHS/SEMDMPNZCIE_iss_0.html

SuitSat release (NASA TV).

http://rapidshare.de/files/12500869/suitsatrelease.ogg.html

Space Weather News for Friday, Feb. 3rd

http://spaceweather.com

SUITSAT: There's a new satellite orbiting Earth, and it's a weird one. On
Friday, Feb. 3rd, at 6:02 pm EST, astronauts threw an old Russian spacesuit
overboard from the International Space Station. The disembodied suit, nicknamed
SuitSat, is now circling Earth and transmitting a radio message which you can
hear using a police scanner or ham radio tuned to 145.990 MHz (FM).

Please visit http://spaceweather.com for more information about SuitSat and how to tune into it.


To fully understand the Suitsat-1 downlinks, some background information is in order.

One of the reasons our Russian colleagues were interested in developing SuitSat was as an on-orbit commemoration of the 175th anniversary of the Bauman Moscow State Technical University. This university is where many of the engineers in the Russian Space Agency graduated. As a result, the Russian-generated messages include congratulatory comments to the Bauman Moscow State Technical University.

In addition to the messages from Russia, there are voice messages from students in Japan, Europe (Spanish and German), Canada (French) and the USA (English). The USA message is from a student enrolled in the Eastern Middle School, Silver Spring, Maryland. Eastern Middle School is a NASA Explorer School. In addition, the Suitsat-1 ID was voiced by a Korean-born young lady enrolled in Paint Branch High School, Burtonsville, Maryland, USA. As you can see, Suitsat-1 truly has an international flavor!

http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/articles/Ba...itsat/index.php


Student drawings aboard SuitSat:

http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/articles/Ba...ges/Figure7.jpg

Unfortunately Suitsat seems to be SuitSilent..................

As I have not read well about the SuitSat news, then when I saw the TV NASA about the SuitSat and I got fearfull since this SuitSpace was drifting away from the ISS. Now I know it. What funny it is!

Rodolfo

Oh.. Frank Poole?? We found him!

Christ, the Russians couldn't even make THIS spacecraft work properly.

Easy to have a laugh at their expense but its my recollection that the Russians appear to have the only working space-craft at the moment. I dont recall the last Cosmonauts the met with a fatal accident, remind me!

But after only two orbits, or about three hours, SuitSat went silent.

“Apparently, the batteries on the spacesuit have either frozen or died,” NASA commentator Rob Navias said. “SuitSat is no longer being heard by ham radio operators around the world.”

SuitSat will eventually burn up in Earth's atmosphere in a few weeks' time, NASA officials said.

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/060204_exp12_eva2.html

Faint signals received by folks in Japan before it went silent.

A pity the duration time was so short.

It didn't go silent, apparently. It was probably just rotating and broadcasting away from Earth earlier this morning. But observations all day from around the world have proven it is working:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/station/exp1...204suitsat.html

Evidently they COULD

SuitSat might have been mooning the Earth (ta-da, da!) as payback for its sentence to death by reentry...but it seems to have gotten over its temper tantrum somewhat!

"SuitSat-1" Designated as AO-54; Signal Reported Weaker

http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2006/02/06/103/?nc=1

NEWINGTON, CT, Feb 6, 2006--Based on recent reports, the already-puny 145.99 MHz
signal from "SuitSat-1" may be getting even weaker. The unusual Amateur Radio
transmit-only satellite, which consists of a discarded Russian Orlan spacesuit
equipped with ham radio gear, was released February 3 by International Space
Station (ISS) Expedition 12 Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev as he and Expedition
12 Commander Bill McArthur, KC5ACR, began a six-hour spacewalk. The crew stuffed
some of its laundry into the spacesuit to help it to keep its form as it orbits
Earth. Over the weekend, AMSAT-NA officially designated SuitSat-1 as AMSAT OSCAR
54 (AO-54). Tony Hutchison, VK5ZAI, in Australia, reported that on its second
pass over his location February 6, SuitSat's signal was down.

"It appeared that signals had deteriorated since yesterday on both passes," said
Hutchison, who's the Australia coordinator for the Amateur Radio on the
International Space Station (ARISS) program, SuitSat's sponsor. "It may be the
angle that SuitSat was when it passed, but on yesterday's passes it was possible
to detect it rolling," Hutchison continued. "I did detect voice this last pass,
but it was well down in the noise, and I didn't hear any SSTV this last pass."

Bob King, VE6BLD, in Alberta, who's managed to copy SuitSat fairly well on
several passes, also noted that the signal's strength had declined from what it
was during the previous two passes he'd heard. Located in DO32, King says he's
using an FT-847 transceiver with the preamplifier on and a 22-element crossed
Yagi with right and left circular polarization providing 19 dB of gain. A preamp
at the antenna feeds into half-inch hardline to the shack. "The bird was almost
overhead, so the signals were about S6 when clear," he reported over the
weekend. "I also received the SSTV signal with some noise."

SuitSat-1 identifies by voice, "This is SuitSat-1, Amateur Radio station RS0RS,"
which was recorded in several languages. The telemetry is digital voice. There's
also a CW ID that reportedly says "Spacesuit-1" instead of "SuitSat-1."
SuitSat-1 also is transmitting a single slow-scan TV image.

SuitSat-1's very weak VHF signal notwithstanding, reports have come from
stations and listening posts literally around the globe. ARISS International
Secretary Rosalie White, K1STO, reports the ARISS Team was continuing to receive
files containing some SSTV audio as well as snippets of voice and CW. "You can
hear deep fades in the signal as the suit spins--something we learned from this
experiment," she said. "The team is coming up with ideas including things that
students can do with all the data we collect from recordings, such as looking at
spin rate and transmission fading." White notes that the SuitSat Web site has
logged some 5 million hits since the beginning of February, and media interest
in the project remains high.

A.J. Farmer, AJ3U, in Maryland, has invited the Amateur Radio and monitoring
communities to post audio clips to his Web site. Farmer reported earlier today
that SuitSat's orbit was some two miles below and one minute ahead of the ISS's.
He points out that several reports indicate that NA1SS aboard the ISS is
re-transmitting SuitSat-1's 2-meter signal on 70 cm by using the ARISS Phase 2
transceiver as a crossband repeater. The crossband repeater downlink frequency
is nominally 437.800 MHz, but Doppler effect can be substantial on UHF.

"This is great news since the SuitSat transmitter output is very low," Farmer
said of the crossband arrangement. He advised tuning about 10 kHz higher at the
start of the pass, moving down to 437.800 when SuitSat-1 is overhead and to
437.790 by the end of the pass. He provided Keplerian elements for use in
satellite tracking software:

1 28933U 05035C 06035.17648092 .00150877 00000-0 98827-3 0 18

2 28933 51.6460 151.5234 0008831 241.8711 118.1817 15.74747302 34

During a series of VHF contacts from NA1SS following the spacewalk, Expedition
12 Commander McArthur expressed surprise that was unable to hear SuitSat-1 from
the ISS shortly after coming inside from the spacewalk. He initially believed
the unique satellite was dead. "We should have been pretty close but didn't hear
anything," he told one station. Scott Avery, WA6LIE, provided downlink audio of
the QSOs.

Some early speculation about SuitSat-1's difficulty has centered on whether
SuitSat-1's batteries might somehow have been adversely affected by the
temperature extremes of space. Telemetry copied by VE6BLD indicated a voltage of
7.0 V, while the nominal battery voltage is 28 V, but it's not known if the
telemetry was accurate.

"It's the same battery we use in our spacesuits," McArthur told another station
in a post-spacewalk QSO, "and so I would think they would handle the
temperature, but it's hard to say." McArthur noted that the batteries on an
Orlan spacesuit are in an external compartment that's already exposed to the
harsh space environment.

McArthur remained upbeat about a future SuitSat mission. "Where there's a will
there's a way," he philosophized. "We've got more suits that need to be
jettisoned." He said the SuitSat-1 project "was pretty well set up and wasn't
that difficult for us to execute."

ARISS Ham Radio Project Engineer Kenneth Ransom, N5VHO, told ARRL today that he
had not seen the low voltage report. "But since the initial reports from Japan
were weak signals, then the issue is likely to have been present from the
start," he said, adding that premature media reports of SuitSat-1's demise were
based on a lack of reports for several orbits. "Little did we know that the
output was so diminished," he said. "It is now apparent that everything is
functioning but that the output level is extremely low." He expressed hopes that
additional telemetry would "help support or dismiss the current list of
potential causes for the low output" and help ARISS to pin down the problem's
cause.

ARISS International Chairman Frank Bauer, KA3HDO, said over the weekend that
evidence to that point in the mission suggested a problem with the antenna, the
feed line, the transmitter output power "and/or any of the connections in
between." Bauer called on stations around the world to help narrow down what's
causing the weak signal by making an extra effort to listen for SuitSat-1 on
145.99 MHz and especially to copy the voice telemetry.

Early on February 4, Bauer was able to hear one overhead pass that included at
least part of the English-language ID, recorded by his daughter, Michelle. "Keep
your spirits up, and let's continue to be optimistic," he urged later in an
official SuitSat-1 status report. "And please keep monitoring!"

NASA Image of SuitSat in Space

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=19587

More images here:

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/images.../ndxpage11.html


And from FPSPACE list, Suitsat being observed visually from Earth:

Message: 3
Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2006 14:31:24 -0600
From: "Jim Oberg" <joberg@houston.rr.com>
Subject: [FPSPACE] Suitsat visually observed, and also sheds debris
To: <fpspace@friends-partners.org>

Suitsat visually observed, and also sheds debris

An object that NORAD is calling 2005-35D (obj # 28934) appears to have broken
off the Suitsat two and a half days after deployment. It seems to have been
identified about three days later, and the first bulletin was issued the following
day. It's big enough to show up on radar, presumably, so what potential pieces
of the Suitsat assembly might possibly work themselves loose in the days AFTER
it was jettisoned?

Meanwhile, Suitsat has been visually observed by the sharp eyes at SeeSat.
Here are two of the descriptions reprinted (credit to the original observers):

Tony Beresford (dberesford@adam.com.au) Date: Fri Feb 10 2006 - 06:34:32 EST

This local evening at 10:47:09.8 I observed Suitsat, using predictions
generated by heavens-above I found it faint but visible in 7x50 binoculars, magnitude
6.7 at a range of 465Km. This observation At the time the objects elevation was 48
degrees.

It was just on nautical twilight. to be careful I ran FINDSAT on the observation
and found no other objects within 20 seconds.

Tony Beresford // 8597, -34.9638,138.6333E, 100m

Michael Waterman (mike.waterman@web-hq.com) Date: Fri Feb 10 2006 - 17:03:41
EST

Suitsat observed 060210 morning, mag 6 to 8 varying irregularly
with period around 5 secs, at 480km, poor phase.

0503503211506021005192057 020 13181065 +3308 008 5 +60+80 I

0503503211506021005194678 020 13185361 +2238 006 5

U.K. Format: http://www.satobs.org/position/UKformat.html

Mike Waterman mike.waterman@web-hq.com

Site Yateley = COSPAR 2115 = 51.3286N 0.7950W 75m (reference OSGB36).

NASA Image of SuitSat in Space

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=19587

Life Imitating Art

http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2006/02/..._imitating.html

"Editor's note: When I first saw the grainy TV imges of SuitSat deployment
I was immediately reminded of an iconic image from the film "2001: A Space
Odyssey". Now that NASA has posted better images, the comparison is even
more obvious."

"SuitSat-1" Keeps on Ticking; Low Power Output Eyed as Cause for Weak Signal
http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2006/02/13/3/?nc=1

Suitsat radio dead; 'glovesat' lives on

Cosmic Log - http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11485023/#060222b

Feb. 22, 2006 | 10 p.m. ET

'GloveSat' spotted: More than two weeks after it was pushed into orbit from
the international space station, the spacesuit-turned-satellite known as SuitSat
appears to have gone silent (http://www.suitsat.org/). Its amateur-radio signal
never was all that strong, which came as a disappointment to many listeners
around the world - but the drama surrounding SuitSat provided plenty of buzz
nonetheless.

In an e-mail, NBC News space analyst James Oberg reports that SuitSat itself
apparently spawned a curious minisatellite of its own just a few days after its
deployment:

"The mystery object was detected on Feb. 11 in the routine tracking data
released by NORAD, which assigned a new 'object number' to the debris on Feb. 9,
showing it to be orbiting very close to the spacesuit. Amateur satellite
watchers in North America and Great Britain shared their calculations with me
that indicated the object's orbit had diverged from the spacesuit three days
earlier, on Feb. 6 - four days after the spacesuit was jettisoned.

"Space engineers I exchanged e-mail with suggested it might be one of the
gloves, or the 'control box' mounted on the helmet. Now I'm being told that the
'working hypothesis' is that the object is one of those gloves, which may not
have been fully 'engaged' when the suit was prepared for jettison.

"The glove is even lighter than the suit and will decay even faster. The suit
itself is visible to trained observers, both with binoculars and even the naked
eye, but the glove would take a computer-steered telescope of some size.

"Suitsat is proving to be even more interesting in its hiccups than it would
have been if all had gone as planned. It's a great experiment."

Theres an outer limits episode waiting to be done about suitsat. Suitsat becomes sentient, returns to earth (we'll gloss over how exactly) and hunts down and kills the engineers that came up with the idea.

"You left me to die in the vacuum of space! arrrrrgh!"

A fellow from Canada has actually filmed Suitsat as it passed overhead!

The quote from Spaceweather.com:

REMEMBER SUITSAT? Three months ago, ISS astronauts hurled an old Russian spacesuit overboard. Amazingly, it is still orbiting Earth. On April 18th, Kevin Fetter videotaped "SuitSat" passing over his home in Brockville, Ontario, Canada: 1 MB movie. (The bright star in the movie is Vega.) Eventually, SuitSat will sink into Earth's atmosphere and disintegrate in spectacular style--a fireball--but not yet!

The film is here:

http://science.nasa.gov/spaceweather/swpod...pr06/fetter.wmv