Commander Tyurin Plans To Tee Off On Space Walk
ISS Commander Mikhail
Tyurin will engage in a little commercial activity during next
Wednesday's scheduled six-hour space walk -- he's going to see how
far he can hit a golf ball in space. US Astronaut Michael
Lopez-Alegria will look on while Tyurin has all the fun. Flight
Engineer Thomas Reiter will monitor ISS systems from inside.
In a Friday press conference, Deputy ISS Program Manager Kirk
Shireman said, "The ISS is in great shape. It's ready to support
the assembly flight, it's certainly ready to support the EVA that
we have coming up a week from now."
Tyurin is to hit one to three balls away from the station at the
start of Wednesday's EVA. Besides promoting its new line of golfing
equipment, the stunt's sponsor Canadian manufacturer Element 21
says it wants to commemorate the 35th anniversary of the last
out-of-this-world golfing excursion -- Astronaut Alan Sheppard's
much publicized golf shots on the moon.
Element 21 says Tyurin will use golf balls that are much
lighter than standard weighing only one gram each -- that's about
the same weight as a US dollar bill. Standard balls weigh around 45
grams.
No one is saying just how much Element 21 paid for the
promotional activity, but it's a sure bet the Russian space agency
ROSCOSMOS can use the money.
Of late the agency has sought private funding in a number of
ways including training and launching a fortunate few into space as
part of a crew. The last to do so was Anousheh Ansari of Ansari
X-Prize fame. She went aloft aboard a Soyuz rocket and spent a few
days with the crew on the ISS. Again, it's not certain exactly how
much she paid for the privilege, but we're sure it costed more than
the basic hit-a-golf-ball-from-orbit package!
Next week's heavenly golf shot was actually scheduled for an earlier EVA,
but was postponed on safety concerns. Those safety concerns have
been allayed by the new balls. Engineers say they have too little
mass to cause any concern to the ISS or other orbiting
vehicles.
Besides, says Shireman, "It's not like Tiger Woods taking a
drive."
Aside from the golf tourney, NASA wants Tyurin and Lopez-Alegria
to install hardware designed to measure charged and neutral
particles in low-Earth orbit. It also hopes the pair can reposition
a nav antenna designed to aid the automated docking of a future
European cargo ship. Also on the agenda is an inspection of another
antenna used to help dock Progress 23 last month. NASA wants to be
sure it's fully retracted.
Oh, in case you were wondering... Engineers say those golf balls
should deorbit in a couple of days on their own. We wonder if that
estimate is dependant on how well Tyurin hits them.