Buzz
From the very beginning of human space travel, both sanctioned and unsanctioned items have made the journey. Even unmanned spacecraft have delivered strange objects to the outer edges of our solar system. Here are a few of those items that have traveled farther than most of us will ever go.
10. Playthings
Starting in 1985, when the shuttle Discovery carried 11 toys into space, these items have frequently made their way beyond Earth. They typically serve educational purposes, with astronauts or cosmonauts demonstrating how they function in microgravity. For example, the STS-54 mission in 1993 took 40 toys to space, and in 1996, STS-77 carried 10. An additional 16 toys and sports equipment were taken to the more spacious International Space Station for testing, with web videos being shared with classrooms across the globe as part of the 'International Toys in Space' initiative.
As part of the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) Program, the Pixar character Buzz Lightyear made the journey on the Space Shuttle Discovery's STS-124 mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The 30.5-centimeter (12 in) action figure orbited Earth for 468 days, engaging in online educational games with elementary school students and hosting science lessons.
When Buzz returned to Earth on September 11, 2009, he was honored with a ticker-tape parade at Walt Disney World, perfectly timed with the opening of the park's 'Toy Story Mania!' attraction. Later, he was placed on display at the Smithsonian.
9. Firearms
Starting in 1986, all Soviet and Russian space missions included the TP-82 triple-barreled pistol. This versatile weapon could fire bullets or signal flares, with its detachable stock doubling as a machete. While it wasn't meant to defend against alien life, it was designed for protection against wild animals like Siberian wolves or musk deer, inspired by the ill-fated Voskhod 2 mission.
In March 1965, Aleksey Leonov became the first human to perform an extra-vehicular activity (EVA), floating in the vacuum of space. However, his suit became over-pressurized, inflating to the point where his feet were no longer in their boots and his hands weren't in their gloves. Unable to reenter feet-first, he had to squirm inside head-first, gradually releasing pressure from his suit.
Things grew even more challenging when it was time to reenter Earth's atmosphere. The automatic guidance system malfunctioned, forcing the cosmonauts to manually control their descent. Worse, they had only enough fuel for one course correction. Their capsule ended up landing 1,500 kilometers (930 mi) away from their intended location, deep in the Siberian wilderness. It also happened to be mating season, a time when Siberian wolves and bears are especially aggressive. They had a pistol, but little else to survive. Fortunately, they were located within hours and rescued the next day after skiing 9 kilometers (5.6 mi) to a clearing for helicopter extraction.
In 1968, a survival kit was designed for all Soviet space missions and included a Makarov pistol. The Makarov was later replaced by the TP-82, which, in turn, was substituted in 2006 with a semi-automatic pistol. And yes, automatics continue to be part of Russian survival kits, meaning that cosmonauts aboard the ISS are indeed carrying them.
8. Pornography
PlayboyConrad's checklist included a spread featuring Angela Dorian (Miss September 1967) with the caption “Seen any interesting hills & valleys?” Another page displayed Reagan Wilson (Miss October 1967) as a “Preferred tether partner.” Bean’s checklist showed Cynthia Myers (Miss December 1968) along with “Don’t forget—describe the protuberances.” Another page featured Leslie Bianchini (Miss January 1969) and the note “Survey her activity.”
Back in the orbiting command module, Richard Gordon was caught off guard to discover a playmate—DeDe Lind (Miss August 1967)—attached to his locker with the label “Map of a Heavenly Body” stuck to it.
7. Luke's Lightsaber
For instance, when the shuttle Discovery launched in October 2007 for a two-week mission to the ISS, it carried 102 items in its OFK. Seventy-six of those items belonged to the crewmembers. Each crewmember is permitted approximately 1 kilogram (2 pounds) of personal items in the OFK.
Flight Commander Pam Melroy included banners from her nephew's school district and her college alma mater in the OFK. Mission Specialist Doug Wheeler, who had developed a friendship with his childhood hero Bobby Murcer after the former New York Yankee was diagnosed with a brain tumor, placed Murcer's jersey and baseball card in the OFK, intending to gift them to Murcer.
Some crewmembers took mementos to express gratitude to the places and organizations that helped them secure a seat on the shuttle. Items such as patches, flags, medallions, pins, photos, and posters were distributed after the flight. NASA and its contractors also packed presentation gifts like patches, pins, bookmarks, banners, and even a copy of the Italian Constitution.
One of the items included in the STS-120’s OFK was the lightsaber prop used by Luke Skywalker in Return of the Jedi. George Lucas requested it be taken into space to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the release of Star Wars: A New Hope.
The lightsaber remained in its Styrofoam box for the entirety of the flight. Nearly all the items in the OFK never leave their storage location throughout the mission.
6. Pocket Change
Coins might seem too ordinary to be considered a curiosity, but think about it: why would astronauts need them? Are they for interstellar toll booths or suborbital vending machines?
The practice of taking items into space to increase their value didn’t begin with the shuttle program. Gus Grissom did so as early as July 1961, when he became the second American in space. Grissom’s 15-minute suborbital flight ended with a splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean. While waiting to be picked up by a helicopter from the USS Randolph, the hatch of Liberty Bell 7 blew open and water began pouring in. Grissom swam out of the hatch.
While treading water and struggling to stay afloat, Grissom realized that in his left leg pocket, he had two rolls of 50 dimes, 30 one-dollar bills, some models of Liberty Bell 7, and two sets of pilot wings. These were souvenirs he had planned to give away after the flight. The added weight was dragging him down. Thankfully, a helicopter arrived soon to rescue him.
However, his capsule sank, and with it, a stash of older coins—Mercury-head dimes from 1935 to 1945—that Grissom had hoped to use as gifts. When Liberty Bell 7 was recovered in 1999 from a depth of 4,900 meters (16,000 feet), 52 Mercury-head dimes were also retrieved, one of which is pictured above.
5. Promotional Strategies for Products
The relationship between space exploration and advertising has always been complex. NASA granted Life magazine exclusive rights to document the lives of the Mercury 7 astronauts and their spouses. The magazine produced numerous articles and even a few books that portrayed the astronauts and their families as ordinary, middle-class Americans. In return, Life provided the astronauts with substantial life insurance policies.
When Apollo 11 made its historic lunar landing in July 1969, 94 percent of televisions across America were tuned in. This was an advertising opportunity no company could ignore. Every contractor involved in the Apollo 11 mission created detailed press kits featuring the mission's logo. Tang became the beverage of choice for both 'spacemen' and Earthlings. Omega Watches were the timepieces worn by astronauts on the Moon.
Coca-Cola entered the space race by investing $250,000 to design a can that could dispense their soda in zero gravity. The company even altered its formula to make the drink easier to consume since carbonated beverages are tough to keep down in zero gravity. When Pepsi heard that NASA was sending the Coke dispenser aboard a shuttle, they responded by spending $14 million to create their own 'space can.'
This marked the beginning of the 'Cola Wars in Space,' which even sparked debates among lawmakers. Coke became the drink of choice for Democrats, while Pepsi gained popularity with Republicans.
In 1985, the Challenger shuttle launched into orbit carrying four cans of each cola. The five-person crew tested the drinks but ended up disliking both. That didn’t stop Pepsi from launching an aggressive ad campaign, dubbing their product 'one giant sip for mankind.'
The Russians joined the space-based marketing efforts as well. In 2000, Pizza Hut launched a campaign to update its image and make it more global. They sponsored the Russian space agency and displayed a 9-meter (30 ft) logo on the side of an unmanned Proton rocket, which was delivering the Zvezda module to the ISS. The following year, they sent a 15-centimeter (6 in) salami and cheese pizza to the ISS crew. Salami was chosen because pepperoni spoiled during space tests. Cosmonaut Yuri Usachov microwaved the pizza and played with it in zero gravity before eating it, giving it a thumbs-up.
4. Bottles of Messages Launched Into the Vastness of Space
The signatures of around 400,000 Earth inhabitantsFour other spacecraft have traveled beyond our solar system, each carrying human greetings for any potential extraterrestrials. Just before the 1972 launch of Pioneer 10 toward Jupiter and deep space, Carl Sagan designed and attached a gold-anodized aluminum plate. The plate featured a visual message, drawn by Sagan's wife, Linda, explaining who sent the spacecraft, as well as the details of its journey’s beginning.
The message's key feature is the pair of circles in the plaque's left corner, symbolizing hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe. A line between the circles represents a spectral line, which is an electron energy transition. In hydrogen, this spectral line has a fixed wavelength (21 centimeters) and frequency (1,420 MHz).
Using the fixed length, the plaque reveals the average height of humans, the distance between the Sun and the center of the Milky Way, the distances from the Sun to each planet in our solar system, and the distances from the Sun to 14 interstellar pulsars. All of this pinpoints our location. Additionally, since the pulsars and our Sun are always in motion at a constant speed, any alien could calculate when Pioneer was launched based on the spectral line’s consistent timing. A matching plaque was attached to Pioneer 11. In his biography, James Van Allen, discoverer of the Van Allen Radiation Belt, proudly stated that he had managed to put his fingerprint on the Pioneer 10 plaque.
Five years later, when Voyagers 1 and 2 were launched to explore the outer reaches of our solar system, Sagan crafted a much more ambitious interstellar message. This message was carried on a 12-inch, gold-plated copper disk, which Sagan referred to as a message in a bottle, launched into the 'cosmic ocean' to convey the story of humankind to any extraterrestrial beings.
The record holds 115 images, along with natural sounds like the crash of surf, thunder, and bird songs, musical selections, a message from President Jimmy Carter, and greetings in 55 different human languages.
3. The Mortal Remains
Celestis Memorial Spaceflights offers to send the ashes of loved ones into space, hitching a ride on a commercial or scientific satellite. The ashes are sealed in a container, placed aboard the Celestis spacecraft, and then attached to the host rocket. Families gather to witness the launch and receive a commemorative DVD.
The inaugural flight took place in April 1997, carrying the ashes of iconic figures such as Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek, and Timothy Leary, the psychologist and advocate of psychedelic drugs.
Eugene Shoemaker, a trailblazer in astrogeology, was selected to be the first geologist to travel to the Moon during the Apollo program. However, his dreams of landing on the Moon were cut short when he was diagnosed with Addison's disease. After his passing in 1997, Celestis sent his ashes to the Moon, where his remains impacted the lunar surface near the south pole in 1999. The impact crater serves as his lasting tribute.
Other notable figures who have been sent into space include James Doohan (Scotty from the original Star Trek series) and Gordon Cooper (one of the original Mercury Seven astronauts). Starting in 2015, Celestis began sending the ashes of pets into space. Packages start at $12,000.
2. Armchairs, Shellacked Hamburgers, Beer, and Bacon
For $60, you can purchase a 60-gram balloon capable of carrying an 800-gram (1.9 lb) payload to 32,000 meters (105,000 ft), or a 2.3-kilogram (5 lb) payload to 26,000 meters (87,000 ft). The Karman line, which marks the boundary between the atmosphere and space, is located at 100,000 meters (328,000 ft), while near space begins at 23,000 meters (75,000 ft).
Some people use these near space balloons for experimentation. In July 2012, students launched petunias in a vase to the stratosphere, where the flowers froze at temperatures of –63 degrees Celsius (–81 °F). Others are motivated by artistic purposes. Azuma Makoto, a Japanese artist, sent a bonsai tree and a floral arrangement into near space, documenting the experience in a project called Exobiotica.
Some do it for the sake of publicity. Two friends reached out to Anheuser-Busch to propose making Natural Light the first beer to be sent into space. The company agreed, and the result was captured in the video above. Meanwhile, Toshiba attached two of its high-definition cameras and a chair to a helium balloon, sending them up to 30,000 meters (98,000 ft) for a commercial shoot.
Others do it simply for the fun of it. Five Harvard students sealed a two-day-old burger and launched it into the stratosphere. When it returned to Earth, it was no longer fit for consumption. In contrast, members of a British cricket club sent bacon aloft, which was eventually cooked and enjoyed.
1. An Inside Joke, Hidden in Plain Sight
In December 2010, SpaceX, a company based in California, successfully launched their Dragon unmanned spacecraft. The capsule completed two orbits around Earth before safely splashing down 804 kilometers (500 mi) off the coast of Mexico in the Pacific Ocean, making it the first commercial spacecraft to accomplish such a feat. This mission served as a test flight for the robotic Dragon in preparation for 12 upcoming cargo flights to the International Space Station after the retirement of the shuttle fleet in 2011.
The only cargo on the test flight was secured inside a drum bolted to the capsule floor, labeled with the words 'Top Secret' and decorated with an image of a spotted cow wearing galoshes. This was a playful nod to the 1984 comedy *Top Secret*. Speculation ran wild about its contents, and once the Dragon lifted off, SpaceX’s CEO Elon Musk teased, saying, 'If you like Monty Python, you’ll love the secret.' Many guessed it was a can of Spam, referencing *Spamalot* from *Monty Python and the Holy Grail*.
When the Dragon successfully splashed down, SpaceX revealed photos showing a large wheel of Gruyère cheese nestled inside the drum. This was a tribute to a Monty Python sketch where John Cleese attempts to order cheese at a cheese shop, only to find that there is none. Musk later shared that he personally went shopping for the cheese in Beverly Hills and bought the largest wheel he could find.
