Coming soon from Toho.

Inspired by recent events in the Sci-Fi Channel series Battlestar Galactica, those wacky Russkies orbiting the planet (don't make me tell you which planet) have decided to dress up a spacesuit with transmitters and throw it out the nearest airlock.

"SuitSat is a Russian brainstorm," explains Frank Bauer of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "Some of our Russian partners in the ISS program, mainly a group led by Sergey Samburov, had an idea: Maybe we can turn old spacesuits into useful satellites." SuitSat is a first test of that idea. Also, vodka positively rules.

As the reportedly empty suit orbits the Earth, it will terrify amatuer astronomers everywhere who have not recieved the latest NASA newsletter. Is the suit merely a ruse to unload the annoying straight-laced geek astronaunt, portrayed by Michael Biehn (The Terminator, The Abyss), or have the plucky group of cosmonauts and astronauts finally met a threat from beyond the galaxy that they could not eat?

"We hope the suit fully burns up in the atmosphere as quickly as possible," an unnamed, rather nervous source was overheard telling a group of men in black suits.

SuitSat, the first public admission of cosmic littering, can be heard by anyone on the ground. "All you need is an antenna (the bigger, the better. Dental fillings don't count), and a radio receiver that you can tune to 145.990 MHz FM," says Bauer. "A police band scanner or a ham radio would work just fine." He encourages students, scouts, teachers and ham radio operators to tune in, but tells dorks with normal radios not to bother.

Bauer expects SuitSat's batteries to last 2 to 4 days. "Although I also believe the Roaming Gnome speaks and travels around of his own free will," he allows. After that, SuitSat--and its mysterious contents--will begin a slow silent spiral into Earth's atmosphere. Weeks or months later, no one knows exactly when, it will become a brilliant fireball over some farm, where the local children will be devoured by the hideous malformed creation that comes spilling from the shielded shoulder plates.

SuitSat is a trademark of those wacky kids at NASA. The terror begins February 3.

Coming soon from Toho.