NASA awards SpaceX $843 million contract to de-orbit ISS
NASA today announced that it has awarded SpaceX a $843 million contract to build a de-orbit spacecraft that can dock to ISS and fire its thrusters so that the station will be safely de-orbited when it is retired in 2030, burning up over the ocean.
While the company will develop the deorbit spacecraft, NASA will take ownership after development and operate it throughout its mission. Along with the space station, it is expected to destructively breakup as part of the re-entry process.
The announcement provided no other details. It is not clear whether the thrusters on a Dragon capsule would be sufficient for this task. Most likely not, which means SpaceX will have to develop something else to do the job. Maybe its bid proposed using a Starship for the task.
It is also not clear whether any modules on ISS will be salvaged for other uses before de-orbit. The modules that the commercial company Axiom plans to attach to ISS in the next year or so are supposed to undock to form its own independent space station sometime later this decade. Will Russia’s modules do the same? And will any other modules?
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
NASA today announced that it has awarded SpaceX a $843 million contract to build a de-orbit spacecraft that can dock to ISS and fire its thrusters so that the station will be safely de-orbited when it is retired in 2030, burning up over the ocean.
While the company will develop the deorbit spacecraft, NASA will take ownership after development and operate it throughout its mission. Along with the space station, it is expected to destructively breakup as part of the re-entry process.
The announcement provided no other details. It is not clear whether the thrusters on a Dragon capsule would be sufficient for this task. Most likely not, which means SpaceX will have to develop something else to do the job. Maybe its bid proposed using a Starship for the task.
It is also not clear whether any modules on ISS will be salvaged for other uses before de-orbit. The modules that the commercial company Axiom plans to attach to ISS in the next year or so are supposed to undock to form its own independent space station sometime later this decade. Will Russia’s modules do the same? And will any other modules?
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Well, that’s a relief. No more “Skylab 2.0” to worry about.
The original de-orbit plan, as I understand it, was to use a pair of Progress freighters to do the job. The demonstrated fragility of the Russian segment of ISS now makes that an increasingly questionable plan. Not to mention that the Russo-Ukraine War is showing the entire Russian state to be increasingly fragile as well. There is a non-trivial chance there will no longer be a Russian state left to provide either the notional pair of Progress craft nor their launchers by the time the currently planned splash date in 2030 rolls around.
As to whatever one-time-use gimcrack SpaceX comes up with to put “Old Yeller” down when the time comes, I suspect anything Starship-based would prove too big and powerful to safely serve. I think it will be based on past and/or current Dragon tech, especially thrusters and attachment mechanisms. Plenty of time left for SpaceX and NASA to reveal the details in advance of deployment.
As to “saving” any major parts of ISS – other than the entire Axiom complex which is already planned for – that seems massively unlikely. During the Rogozin era at Roscosmos, there was a lot of loose talk about hiving off the Russian modules and repurposing them as the core of a new Mir-class station to be called ROS. I notice there has been little or no such talk since Rogozin was sacked. The Russians have moved on to entertaining other equally unachievable fantasies instead.
Saving any non-Russian modules for notional return to Earth and museum display looks almost equally unlikely. The expense of trying to do so would be considerable. The danger of making the attempt would also be considerable. I don’t see that happening.
Nor do I see any attempt at “saving” ISS in some notional higher “graveyard” orbit as sensible even if it was financially and logistically feasible – neither of which it is. ISS would simply be a fat 450-tonne target for random future debris object strikes, which would spall off still more debris objects or even break the station’s corpse up into two or more large pieces.
Moving said corpse to lunar or Martian orbit, as some who are obviously completely ignorant of orbital mechanics have naively suggested, is out for the same reasons. ISS is already pretty thoroughly worn out. By 2030, it will be even more so. Play taps, send the SpaceX robot headsman and give the thing a last fiery hurrah and decent burial at sea.
Much of the ISS is worn out, but some modules are not. My understanding is that those parts are intended to be taken off the ISS as part of the Axiom station when the rest is deorbited.