Tuvok: Asteroid Hunter – Tim Russ of Voyager fame is tracking asteroids with NASA

Tim Russ is known for his time on Star Trek: Voyager as Tuvok but that’s not all anymore.

Tim Russ played Tuvok, the chief security officer aboard the U.S.S. Voyager. During his time on Voyager, he became Captain Kathryn Janeway’s most respected and trusted officer. Tuvok was one of a handful of Federation spies that infiltrated the Maquis ship and spied on eventual commander Chakotay and eventual chief of engineering B’Elanna Torres.

When the ruse was revealed, Tuvok had to recommit himself to Janeway, the Voyager, and his former Maquis brethren and did so with duty, class, and integrity. He was supposed to keep an eye on things as the crew ventured together through the Delta Quadrant, and now, the man who brought Tuvok to life is helping NASA do the same job.

Only from here on Earth.

According to USA Today, Russ is actually tracking asteroids for NASA these days.

Tim Russ is Tuvok: Asteroid Hunter of the U.S.S. Voyager

Russ is actually helping NASA with an upcoming mission these days. Russ, who’s a citizen astronomer, has been part of the LA Astronicomical Society for nearly 30 years, which was right about the time Russ landed his first role in Star Trek as Devor on The Next Generation. Russ told US Today that he’s made astronomy a hobby for the last 35 years and that Star Trek and his love of space were just a happy coincidence.

So why is Russ helping NASA, you ask, well almost like the Voyager two-parter The Future’s End, Rus and his five fell citizen astronomers have a technology that no one else seems to. The six people who make the Los Angeles Astronomical Society have a telescope that can find asteroids. Due to this, they received an email from Unistellar, the manufacturer of the telescope, and asked if they’d be willing to help NASA by volunteering their time and energy to help them locate Patroclus, an asteroid that orbits the planet Jupiter.

NASA wants to launch a probe to study Trojan Asteroids, of which Patroclus is a part of. Apparently, Russ’s telescope can track such things, as he told USA Today;

"[The Unistellar eVscope and eQuinox telescope] will simply find a starfield on its own and it will figure out where it is. You just punch in the object you want to go see. After you punch that in, it will move to that object on its own and it’ll hold it and track it. Then, it’ll layer the images for that object so the object becomes much bigger in size."

The mission that Russ is helping on will include the launch of Lucy the satellite, and it will track the astroids for over 12 years, sending back copious amounts of data.