Student-Made Satellite Going Out in Blaze of Glory

Depending on how early you're reading this Tuesday morning, you may have already missed it: Starshine, a 3-foot diameter aluminum ball covered with mirrors, is fini today.

Students had a hand in the design and even the manufacture of the unsophisticated satellite, a 200-pound ball launched in September of 2001, by an Air Force/NASA rocket, on what was called the "Kodiak Star Mission." The the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory did the actual design work; and Project Starshine, including thousands of schoolkids, picked up the lion's share of the outside labor. Each of the satellite's mirrors, for instance, was hand-polished by school-age volunteers.

This particular satellite, Starshine 3, was actually the second to be launched. Starshines 1 and 2 were deployed on Shuttle Missions.

It contains, as its only working parts, a small radio transmitter that allows amateur radio buffs a chance to pick it up, every minute or two. Its dual raison d'etre is to show itself to us earthbound clods, through its high reflectivity; and to demonstrate orbital decay; and its show will be over by 9AM EST today.

The little sphere is expected to be fully-burned in the high atmosphere, a parameter of its original design, somewhere between Canada and India. Project Starshine continues to involve schoolkids -- Starshine 4 and 5 are waiting for room on future launches. The whole program is a labor of love, of Gil Moore (above, with smaller Starshine, in Kerry Kirkland photo), who, MSNBC says, was involved in the space program from the early days at White Sands (NM) before retirement. "We don’t own motor homes or have time-shares in Florida," he told the news service. "This is what we do with our retirement money. We teach kids about science."

FMI: www.azinet.com/starshine/descript.htm