Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The International Space Station

Starting point is 00:00:00 Even before human beings first went into orbit, there have been dreams of establishing a permanent presence in space. For almost the last 25 years, humanity has achieved just that. At least one human being has been in Earth orbit without interruption for almost a quarter century. What has allowed this to happen is one of the most complex and expensive things ever built. Learn more about the International Space Station, its history, and its future on this episode of Everything Everywhere daily. Do you ever climb into bed ready to sleep only to have your mind start racing the moment your head hits the pillow? Thoughts bouncing around, replaying the day or jumping ahead to tomorrow? That is exactly why Catherine Nikolai created Nothing Much Happens. Each episode is a gentle, cozy bedtime story

Starting point is 00:00:55 where, well, nothing much happens. No drama, no tension. Nothing you need to follow closely. Just soft narration, calming repetition, and soothing sensory details designed to help your mind slow down and your body relax. It's not about entertainment. It's not about entertainment. it's about rest, and millions of listeners around the world use it every night to quiet their thoughts and finally fall asleep. If you've ever struggled to shut your brain off at night, this might be exactly what you've been missing. You can listen to Nothing Much Happens wherever you get your podcasts. Episodes are every Monday and Thursday. Even before Yuri Gagarin was launched into space, people began thinking about how we could permanently live in space. Constantine

Starting point is 00:01:39 Sealkovsky, the Russian rocket researcher who is considered to be the father of rocket science, people living permanently in space as early as the start of the 20th century. In 1929, the Slovenian theorist Herman Plotlchnik was the first to envision a rotating wheel in orbit that could simulate the Earth's gravity. Werner von Braun, the head of the German and later American rocket programs, wrote about a Plotchnik-style space station in a 1951 magazine article. So the idea of having a place to go in Earth orbit was nothing new and even predated actual human spaceflight.

Starting point is 00:02:11 When humans did finally make it to space in the early 1960s, it became obvious that they had nowhere to go. Each flight was in a tiny capsule for a very short amount of time. The Americans did eventually find a destination for their space program, the moon. The Soviets, however, never really made a serious attempt at landing humans on the moon like the Americans did. They pursued another strategy of creating space stations. The first space station in history was Saluet 1, which was launched in April 1971. There were only two trips to salute one, and both did not go according to plan. Soyuz 10 failed to dock, and Soyuz 11 did manage to dock, and the crew spent 23 days on board,

Starting point is 00:02:52 but the three-man crew was killed upon re-entry. The Americans canceled their last three Apollo missions to fund their own space station project called Skylab. Skylab was built out of a modified Saturn 5 rocket and was launched on May 14, 1973. Over the next nine months, it was occupied by three crews for a total of 24-wobes. weeks. After Skylab, all space station activity for almost the next 25 years was by the Soviets. They launched five more salute space stations that could host cosmonauts for longer and longer lengths of time. This finally accumulated in the Mir space station in 1986. Mir, which is the Russian word for peace, was the first modular space station. It consisted of several different sections

Starting point is 00:03:34 which were flown into orbit on different missions and then assembled by cosmonauts in orbit. it. MIR smashed all previous space station records, where Saluet 7 had been occupied for a total of 861 days, MIR was occupied for a total of 4,594 days over a period of 12 and a half years. 3,644 of those days were consecutive. Americans during this period had plans for a space station that never materialized. A space station named Freedom was supposed to be the primary destination of the space shuttle. It was to have modules built by the European and Japanese space agencies, but the space station never materialized, giving the space shuttle nowhere to go. What changed everything was the end of the Cold War. With the Soviet Union gone, the space race wasn't so much a rivalry anymore.

Starting point is 00:04:23 The Russians and Americans found it easier and cheaper for both countries to work together. The first and most obvious way to cooperate was to have the space shuttle with nowhere to go visit the mere space station, which was already in orbit. Between 9th and the 9th,000, which was already in orbit. In 1994-1908, there were 10 shuttle flights up to Mir carrying both Americans and Russians on board. While having the shuttle fly to Mir was a cheap and obvious solution, it wasn't a long-term solution. Mere was a wholly owned and controlled Russian space station, and it was limited in terms of size and mission life. When the shuttle Mere program was announced in 1993, the Russians and the Americans also announced that they would jointly develop a new space station. The Americans dusted off the plans for the unbuilt space station freedom and adapted it for a new space station which would be built with international partners.

Starting point is 00:05:12 They also had access to the two decades of Russian experience with their multiple space stations. The new space station was dubbed the International Space Station, or ISS, and it would be significantly larger than MIR. Whereas MIR could only host a crew of three, the ISS could host a crew of seven and as many as 13 temporarily. The ISS was to be modular, so each segment of the space station could be built and launched separately, just so long as everything managed to fit and work together in the end. That meant that each international partner in the project could work on and deliver their own segment. The first module of the ISS was launched in November 1998. It was the Izara module built by the Russians, also known as the functional cargo block. This module served as the core to build off of as it provided

Starting point is 00:05:57 electricity, storage, and propulsion. Two weeks later, the Americans launched the Unity module. The Unity module allowed the space shuttle to dock, and it has an airlock that allows astronauts to go outside for spacewalks. This was then followed by the Russian-built Zvezda module, which provided living crew quarters and life support systems for the ISS. These modules served as the core of the station, and once they were in place, it was possible to start hosting astronauts. The first mission to the International Space Station was Expedition 1, which was launched from the Belkynor Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. They arrived at the station on November 2nd in the year 2000. Since their arrival, there has been a continuous human presence on the ISS. As of the day I am

Starting point is 00:06:40 am recording this episode, humans have been on the ISS and in space for 22 years and 185 days straight. These modules were just the beginning of what the space station would become. The ISS was constructed over a span of 11 years from 1998 to 2011. Additions included multiple nodes, modules, habitats, and laboratories. It also included the largest and most visible part of the ISS, the integrated trust structure. The integrated trust structure is the 110-meter metal trust system that supports the solar panels and antennas for the space station. The space station was not just a joint Russian and American effort. There were contributions by other space agencies as well. The Columbus Science Laboratory was constructed by the European Space Agency, as was the Kupola, which is a windowed observation module.

Starting point is 00:07:29 The Japanese provided the Kibu Experimental module, and the Canadian Space Agency provided the Canada Arm 2, which is the primary robotic arm in the space station, as well as Dexter, which is a two-armed robot. While the ISS was declared complete in 2011, it has been constantly maintained, and additional modules have been added as recently as 2021. The International Space Station holds many superlatives. It is the largest man-made object in history to fly in space. It has a total span that is the size of a football field regardless which type of football you consider. The total mass of the space station is over 450,000 kilograms or 990,000 pounds. It travels at a speed of 17,500 miles per hour or 28,000 kilometers per hour at an altitude of approximately 250 miles or 400 kilometers. It also has the distinction of being the most expensive object ever built, with an estimated cost

Starting point is 00:08:26 of over $150 billion. Since the first crew members entered the station in November of 2000, 266 people have visited the ISS. There have been 162 Americans, 57 Russians, 11 Japanese, 9 Canadians, 5 Italians, 4 French, 4 Germans, 2 Emirati, and one each from, Belgium, Brazil, Denmark, Great Britain, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, the Netherlands, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Israel, and Sweden. There is a major problem with a space station of this size and at this altitude. The ISS is in low Earth orbit. At this altitude, it is almost a total vacuum. Almost, but not quite. There are just enough gas molecules

Starting point is 00:09:08 at this altitude to cause a tiny bit of atmospheric drag. When you're traveling at such incredible speeds, the drag can add up even though it's quite small. If nothing is done, the ISS would lose two kilometers a month in altitude due to atmospheric drag, and the lower your altitude, the more drag you experience, dropping your altitude even faster. The ISS has to regularly boost itself to a higher orbit to compensate for this atmospheric drag, and these adjustments require seven and a half tons of fuel per year. The ISS needs to constantly be resupplied with food, water, and fuel for the astronauts. These resupply missions are conducted without passengers on board

Starting point is 00:09:47 and are mostly handled by private contractors, in particular, SpaceX and Northrop Grumman. Despite having served far longer than any other spacecraft in history, the international space station is nearing the end of its lifespan. The big question has been, what to do with it. Currently, the ISS is scheduled to operate at least through 2024, although there are plans to extend its mission through 2028 or 2030. Regardless how long its lifespan is extended, this almost certainly is the last decade for the international space station.

Starting point is 00:10:18 In addition to the general wear and tear of being in space for a quarter century, the political situation has deteriorated between its main partners, the United States and Russia. It's unlikely that future cooperation is possible or even desired. Furthermore, technology has changed, in some cases dramatically. Continuing to throw money at something outdated doesn't make sense after a certain point, and that point has. as already arrived. The big question then is, what do you do with it? One option is to send it to an even higher orbit where it would be safe. The higher the orbit, the less drag, and the longer it takes for an orbit to decay. This would at least allow the option of mothballing the station for use at a later date. Another option is to just do nothing. Given the drag on the space station, it would

Starting point is 00:11:03 de-orbit on its own in about 12 to 18 months. The problem with that is that it's so large that significant pieces of it will probably hit the Earth, which is exactly what happened with both Skylab and Mir. The most probable fate of the ISS will be a controlled deorbiting. The current plan is to de-orbit the ISS in 2013. It would probably require a special module to push the entire space station so that it de-orbits at the right place in time. The final resting place for the International Space Station will probably be somewhere around Point Nemo, the most isolated place on Earth in the Southern Pacific Ocean, of which I've done a previous episode. Will the end of the International Space Station mean the end of a permanent presence of humans in

Starting point is 00:11:47 space? The answer is almost certainly not, but it is possible there could be a gap between the end of the ISS and whatever comes after it. And it could be that that gap is filled by a Chinese space station. NASA's Artemis program is planning for a space station in lunar orbit, but perhaps not with a permanent crew. The current thinking is that NASA may just leave the creation of of another space station up to private companies who could do it at a much lower cost. Also, instead of one large space station, it might be several smaller ones that serve different purposes. Regardless what the future has in store for the International Space Station, for the last 25 years, it has been the focal point of human space exploration and space science.

Starting point is 00:12:27 It is the largest and most complex object ever to fly in space, and the most expensive thing which has ever been built by humans. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Thor Thompson and Peter Bennett. I just want to thank everyone, including the show's producers, who support the show over on Patreon. If you'd like to support the show, just head over to patreon.com, which is currently the only place where you can get show merchandise. Also, if you want to talk to other listeners about the show, head over to our Facebook group or Discord server, both of which have links in the show notes.

Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The International Space Station

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