ZERO-G DINOSAUR made from bits and bobs by space station flight engineer

An astronaut and expert robotics engineer serving aboard the International Space Station has built a dinosaur from odds and ends salvaged from around the orbiting outpost. What an expert NASA roboticist is capable of 'Naut Karen Nyberg, who currently holds the job of flight engineer on the station, is an expert roboticist …

[Anonymous Coward]

Beware of reapers ...

The last space-faring toy dinosaur owner of my experience ended badly whilst claiming to be 'a leaf on the wind'. A cautionary tale ...

[Moof]

Re: Beware of reapers ...

I think you mean reavers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaver_(Firefly)

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Beware of reapers ...

Indeed I do.

I've clearly been playing too much Mass Effect recently and it's addled and confused my brain!

[Adrian Jones]

Re: Beware of reapers ...

Curse its sudden but inevitable betrayal!

[JonP]

Re: Beware of reapers ...

Reavers!

[Euripides Pants]

Re: Beware of reapers ...

Don't fear the Reaper

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRYABA0saFw

[vonRat]

Re: Beware of reapers ...

That song needs more cowbell...

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/628756/

[Kane]

I swear by my pretty floral bonnet...

...I will end you

[Trollslayer]

I for one

Welcome our dinosaur overlords!

[VinceH]

Re: I for one

"Welcome our dinosaur overlords!"

...from SPAAAAAAAAAACE!

[fearnothing]

That is one hell of a lucky kid. I wish my mum had been an astronaut and had made a toy in space for me. BEST MUM EVER.

[Euripides Pants]

Re: BEST MUM EVER

Yeah, the rest of us have to take our kids to Yellowstone. They're bored until they realize that their parents took them camping inside a giant volcano.

[Yag]

Indeed... She's awesome!

Smart, caring mother, geeky... and pretty on top of that. Wow.

She really deserve to takes the place of those vapid retards that pass for "role models" for young girls around the world.

Unfortunately, i'm afraid it won't happens.

[NoOnions]

Next project...

...just has to be a pig...

[Steve the Cynic]

Re: Next project...

"...just has to be a pig..."

*TWO* pigs (more at your discretion), because it has to be *Pigs*, not *Pig*.

[NoOnions]

Re: Next project...

Fair point, well made! ;-)

[Michael H.F. Wilkinson]

Re: Next project...

Sounds like a job for dr. Bunsen Honeydew

[Anonymous Coward]

Used space-faring female T-shirt scraps...

*breathes in deeply*

Ohhhhhhhhhhh...

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Used space-faring female T-shirt scraps...

So what you're saying is, it's not so much dinosaur as dino-phwoarrrr...

[note to self: Learn from the example of the above commentard, and remember to post anonymously to preserve remaining shreds of reputation.]

[Graham O'Brien]

How much import tax

will she have to pay on it as it's made from a mixture of US and non-US materials and wasn't assembled in the USA? And will NASA levy delivery charges? Could be a bit expensive. Brilliant present though

[Anonymous Coward]

Finally the ISS has generated a useful product!

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it me, or do those eyes look remarkably like space suit material, and about the same size as the holes which mysteriously appeared in that drowning blokes space suit?

[Anonymous Coward]

She made her son a T-Rex IN SPACE?!

And out of genuine spacegoing materials too?!

Is it possible to vote her for Queen of Mums? Or a 'Nobe Prize for Parenting'?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not got much to do up there have they...

[Alister]

crafted from Russian food podules

Yay!

You managed to get the word "PODULES" into a headline!

:-)

[Fatman]

Thank $DEITY that dinosaur wasn't purple!!!

[Benchops]

purple dinosaur

Barney is a dinosaur from our imagination

He's made from all the bits that fall

out from my mum's space station.

I never watched it. honest.

[Graham Marsden]

She didn't make it...

... it's just Bob the Dinosaur who's been hiding behind the furniture!

[Uncle Siggy]

Stitch in time...

Perhaps we can get this space faring seamstress to knit a new ISS module to replace replace the OPSEK project the Russians are proposing.

[Charybdis]

Karen Nyberg is a Whovian

..."It's a DINOSAUR on a SPACESHIP".....

And that is just so ridiculously cool... like a fez... or a Stetson.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm an old cynic

and given the times we live in, I venture a guess: it was all carefully staged by NASA PR-subcontractor partners to provide a "human touch". You know, like a painting of a squashed fly on a spotless German during a car show, by a perfect Germanic hostess, just because she thought it would be "nice": Germans have a sense of humour too, ja, it was my own idea.

I hope I'm wrong here and the dino was spontaneous...

[cray74]

Re: I'm an old cynic

Astronauts get some downtime on the station. This astronaut, Karen Nyberg, is noted as enjoying sewing as a hobby (see her wiki entry). The dino is made of materials sourced in situ: food pack liners and T-shirt scraps. While I could see NASA playing up the PR aspect after she made the dinosaur, I don't think the actual sewing of the dinosaur was staged - it fits Mrs. Nyberg's hobby, available resources, and family situation.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats one small handicraft for Womankind one giant present for a kid.

That's it!

if some dad up there does not build a Zero-G Scalextric or fashion a catapult from space station offcuts I'm getting a sex change.

[ravenviz]

Re: Thats one small handicraft for Womankind one giant present for a kid.

catapult from space station

Er, Houston, we have a problem!

[brainwrong]

Materials

Did she take any bits off of Luca Parmitano's spacesuit?

[Tikimon]

Modern scrimshaw variant!

Ivory's hard to come by and very non-PC these days. Bored sailors gotta fill the off-watches with something, eh?

And it's SOOO CUTE!

[Evil Auditor]

Job of flight engineer

Nice job! (both her job and with the dinosaur)

But why does the ISS need a flight engineer? Thought they were in free fall...