The penultimate space shuttle mission took off from Cape Canaveral on Monday with an unusual passenger — Czech cartoon character Krtek, in the allotted personal belongings of astronaut Andrew Feustel.
“My hope was to select an item that would capture the attention of both children and adults,” Feustel said when he first announced that he would be taken the beloved character with him in March, according to press reports at the time. The puppet version of Krtek was custom made for the voyage, as it is lighter and flatter than fully stuffed versions. Feustel’s mother-in-law is from Znojmo, South Moravia.
The cartoon mole, who is popular in much of the world but little known in the US, is not the only pop culture connection for the mission. It was also Feustel’s idea to create a mission poster based on the most recent Star Trek movie. Feustel told the media that the film “Star Trek” was uplinked to the Atlantis in 2009, when he was a crewmember on that mission.
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