ISS Crew Prepares for Space Walk, “SuitSat-1″ Launch

NEWINGTON, CT, Jan 27, 2006–Preparations for a walk in space are taking center stage onboard the International Space Station. The Amateur Radio community will be paying closer-than-usual attention Friday, February 3, when Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur, KC5ACR, and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev exit the ISS. That’s because one of the first things they’re expected to do is place “SuitSat-1″–a surplus Russian Orlan spacesuit that’s been outfitted with an Amateur Radio transmitter–into Earth orbit. SuitSat is a project of the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) program.

“SuitSat is a Russian brainstorm,” ARISS International Chairman Frank Bauer, KA3HDO, explains in an article about SuitSat on the Science@NASA Web site. Bauer works at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. He credits ARISS-Russia’s Sergei Samburov, RV3DR, and his colleagues with coming up with the concept of turning the old spacesuit into a novel satellite. SuitSat is a first test of that idea, Bauer says.

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