Krtek, the Czechoslovak cartoon character invented by Zdeněk Miler in 1956, will be a passenger —in plush form — on the NASA space shuttle Endeavour when it goes on a 14-day mission scheduled to begin April 19.
Astronaut Andrew Feustel — whose mother-in-law is from Znojmo, South Moravia — will take a 19-centimeter stuffed version of Krtek along with him as one of his alloted 0.68 kilograms of personal items.
“I am pleased to announce that when I launch on space shuttle Endeavour in April, a famous character that has been part of Czech culture for over 60 years will be launching to space with me. That character is Krtek,” Feustel said in a NASA video. “We look forward to sharing this great experience with all of you and hope you are able to follow the mission [as we go to the International Space Station to deliver scientific instruments] and safely return space shuttle Endeavor to earth on her voyage.”
‘A famous character that has been part of Czech culture for over 60 years will be launching to space with me. That character is Krtek.’
The character, known as Little Mole in English, has been popular across the communist and post-communist world including Cuba, China, Eastern Europe and Vietnam. Krtek and his friends — who include a rabbit, hedgehog and a frog — have even made some inroads in Western Europe.
“My hope was to select an item that would capture the attention of both children and adults,” Feustel said, as cited by the Wall Street Journal (WSJ). “Krtek has delighted the imagination of the Czech people for many generations.”
The first cartoon in the Krtek series was narrated, but after that the cartoons simply had music and sound effects tracks. Apart from a few odd words, the characters never speak, which made the cartoons easy to export.
So far, fame has eluded Krtek in the US. “Krtek’s space flight may help popularize him — even in America,” Jana Malá, head of Moravská ústředna Brno, the sole licensed maker of Krtek toys in the Czech Republic, told the WSJ. A special light-weight version of a Krtek hand puppet — hollowed out to save on weight — was designed for space travel.
This in not Krtek’s first space adventure. The third cartoon in the series, “Krtek a raketa” (Little Mole and the Rocket) from 1965 saw Krtek fly to a deserted island on a rocket and repair his ship with the help of a crab.
The mission will be the 25th and last for Endeavour, which went into service in 1992. After it is decommissioned just one shuttle will remain in service, Atlantis, which has a mission scheduled for June 2011.
The main task of the Endeavour’s final mission is to deliver the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a physics experiment module, and the ExPRESS Logistics Carrier (ELC), a type of payload platform and related infrastructure, to the International Space Station.
