The ISS Marks 10 Years In Space

Matt_dk writes to point out the upcoming tenth anniversary of the International Space Station in two days' time. "On 20 November 1998, a Russian Proton rocket lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome for a historic mission: It was carrying the first module of the International Space Station ISS, named Zarya (Russian for 'dawn'). This cargo and control module, which weighs about 20 tonnes and is almost 13 meters long, provides electrical power, propulsion, flight path guidance and storage space. The launch of the module... heralded a new era in space exploration, as, for the first time ever, lasting cooperation in space was achieved between Russia, the US, Europe, Canada and Japan. Over the next ten years, many other modules were brought into orbit, and ISS developed into the largest human outpost in space. Since that time, the building blocks, transported by Russian launch vehicles or the US Space Shuttle, have expanded the ISS to the size of a soccer pitch and a current total mass of about 300 tons."

Comments

Re:Pee

[symes]

We all drink recycled pee - there's only so much water on this planet and, according to some estimates, most of it has been drunk eight times already. So unless they were drinking outer space water, rather than earth water, they most certainly were drinking recycled pee for the past ten years.

Re:And for what?

[Smidge207]

"Lasting cooperation in space was achieved between Russia, the US, Europe, Canada and Japan..."

I'd say that's pretty remarkable.

=Smidge=

Should it really cost as much as it does?

[jollyreaper]

I'm a big space geek, don't get me wrong. I'm all for space stuff. But I'm horrified when I look at the price tags on these projects. Should they really cost this much? Are we sure that there isn't a lot of contractor pocket-lining going on? It seems to me like we're using a lawn sprinkler to fill up a dixie cup. Yeah, it'll get the job done but it'll take about ten gallons of water to put five ounces in the cup.

If I seem disappointed and ungrateful it's just that putting rinky dink modular stations in orbit is 1970's technology. We should have moon colonies right now using mass drivers to fire off raw materials to the lagrange points where we'd be building giant wheel and cylinder habitats.

Looking at our space program, it's like going back home and seeing the people you went to school with who peaked in high school and are hanging around the old haunts just looking underachieving and pathetic. I mean yeah, it's cool to point and laugh if these were the people you hated in high school but if they were your friends, it's just very sad. NASA peaked as Apollo and has been underachieving ever since.

Re:Should it really cost as much as it does?

[arkhan_jg]

The standard estimated total cost of the ISS (difficult to measure precisely given the multinational aspect) is between $50 billion and $100 billion. Over 10 years.

In comparison, the US military budget for 2009 is $711 billion. $10 billion is spent a month in Iraq alone. total estimated cost of that war so far over 6 years? $660 billion, and that's just US costs.

Going into space for long periods safely, or as safely as is practicable anyway, is very, very hard. I'm not saying the ISS is cheap, but it's not bad in the grand scheme of things.

Re:Should it really cost as much as it does?

[AsnFkr]

NASA peaked as Apollo and has been underachieving ever since.

I agree with you (for the most part) on this statement relating to manned space exploration, but NASA has had much success in robotic space exploration in the past 40 years that should not be ignored.

Re:Should it really cost as much as it does?

[Darth_brooks]

NASA peaked as Apollo and has been underachieving ever since.

I see that line of thinking as somewhat skewed. We went to the moon, what was left to do? Mars? Not with 1975 tech. I just don't see that being feasible. Sure, we sidetracked ourselves in terms of long distance exploration with the Shuttle, but does the communications revolution that has taken place since the mid 70's happen without NASA trucking up the school-bus sized satellites of the late 70s and early 80's? Sure you can throw those up with rockets, but the shuttle doesn't do a *bad* job of moving big-ass cargo into space.

NASA gets hounded because countries like India and China are now doing things like sending probes to the moon in India's case, and manned spacewalks in China's case. While those are great accomplishments, we were doing those things with slide rules and navigation computers that has 4k of memory and a few hundred lines of code.

China and India pulling off these "stunning accomplishments" while standing firmly on the shoulders of giants. They're booking plane tickets to Cleveland online and being treated like true aviation pioneers, and NASA is being told "What have you done lately Orville and Wilbur? That stupid little biplane thingie? who cares about that anymore. You guys suck."

Where are the Japanese Mars rovers? Where is the Indian Space agency's ISS module? Gosh, it's awfully nice that India has managed to bounce a glorified digital camera off of the moon. That's awesome. Maybe NASA can budget for something cool like that once they're done with that whole "New Horizons" probe that's on its way to Pluto.

Yeah, there are a ton of bureaucratic nightmares in the NASA that weigh down our successes. Mind blowing awesomeness gets shouted down because someone forgot to do a metric-imperial conversion. But NASA is helping *private industry* do things that other nations space programs are trying to get a handle on. (X-prize anyone?)

NASA isn't hanging around the high school parking lot. They're the kid that's easy to pick on because he moved out of town and got his masters degree....while the rest of the world is still talking about how cool it has to have a diploma. We don't have a perfect space agency, but in the face of a red-tape, agenda driven, too-screwed-up-to-be-a-dilbert-cartoon middle management nightmare, we are still doing things that no other space agency in the world is doing. The only group that is even close is a consortium of TEN other nations.

Explain to me again why that isn't cool?

Re:Should it really cost as much as it does?

[carambola5]

As one who has formerly worked on NASA contracts (and hopes to continue to do so in the future... just because it's so damn cool), I can assure you of two things:

-You are right, and
-You are wrong.

You are right in that there is some fat that could be skimmed from the process; there is some highly skilled labor that sits idly as projects continue onward.

You are wrong, however, to assume that space technology is getting cheaper by the minute, and the industry should be able to continue along at the same speed as... say, consumer electronics. Designing for space is crazy-expensive.... ridiculously expensive... and the problem isn't NASA or its subcontractors. It's the vendors.

NASA and its subcontractors make stuff. We either design it from scratch (frequently), update an off-the-shelf item (sometimes), or just use an off-the-shelf item unmodified (rarely).

Designing from scratch costs the most in terms of high- and low-skilled labor (think engineers and mill operators) and material. It's also the most frequent due to the many requirements of spaceflight: radiation hardened, extremely light weight, strict volume requirements, high vibration launch environment, low outgassing, low flammability, etc.

Updating an off-the-shelf part is a little easier, but it still involves plenty of engineer time. In addition, the original part is usually on the extreme high-end of a vendor's offering. We can't have a coolant pump that has an MTBF of 2 years. It's gotta be 10. or more.

And finally, even if an off-the-shelf part is used by itself, it still needs brackets and an electrical interface (if necessary). Plus there's plenty of engineer time spent just to be sure that it's flight-worthy.

And finally, multiply all of these costs by the factor of not mass-producing this stuff. When you order only 5 specialized valves, the unit cost is going to balloon.

So, jollyreaper, I applaud your space geekiness. There are many like us. But designing and building for space is hard. And it costs a lot. Them's the facts.

Now, if we (the space industry as a whole) got a three-fold increase in funding... you'd really start to see some sweet stuff.

Re:Pee

[snspdaarf]

Water, the refreshing beverage that rusts pipes, and fish fuck in!

Makes recycled pee seem tame by comparison.

Re:How much does it weigh in space?

[CensorshipDonkey]

Newton is a measurement of force, and therefore weight, not mass, as you point out. However, pounds are ALSO a unit of force, not mass, and therefore tons (2,000 pounds) is weight. I think your pedantry is wrong, you've merely converted from Imperial weight/force to metric weight/force.

What does it have to show for it ?

[savuporo]

So for these several tens of billions sunk, and the "World class science facility" still not being really operational, what does it have to show for this cash and ten years ?
How much technology advancement really has happened and what scientific goals have been accomplished ?

There has been some useful stuff, but wouldnt it be nice to see it all these shortly summarized in a table with the bottomline dollar drawn under it ?

Re:What does it have to show for it ?

[vlm]

How much technology advancement really has happened and what scientific goals have been accomplished ?

That was all cut to save money. Sadly I'm not kidding. There is a short list here of scientific modules launched. Plenty more were budget cut or just simply won't be launched. The original plan had a hotel load around 2 people, which was fine since there would be like two dozen folks up there (hotel load is how much it takes to keep the place running and human habitable, from navy and submarine terminology). The problem is the life support equipment and "space lifeboat" never was launched, crew endlessly downsized, etc. So, since it only holds about 3 people on a regular basis, and the hotel load is always larger than originally planned, there isn't much time to do anything other than be space janitors / space superintendents. If they could have a staff of 20 up there as originally intended then quite a bit could have been done, but thats not happening.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station#Scientific_ISS_modules

Part of the problem, as described below, is the only purpose of the shuttle, is to visit the station, and the only purpose of the station, is to be visited by the shuttle. So, since the station has already been downsized to the point of uselessness, and the shuttle is going away, guess what will happen to the station in just a few years?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station#Future_of_the_ISS

Another part of the problem is the ISS was project managed as a one-time project or one-time stunt. Anyone who's ever spent time in a lab, in the military, or even in front of a computer, knows the original plan is obsolete as soon as it's written. Thats OK, invent a new plan. Except everything relating to ISS project management is a one time stunt. It's a permanent beta releast version 0.99 with no possibility of upgrade. There is no ability to do science if you can't iteratively experiment and try new ideas. And that's not how the ISS was project managed. Therefore it doesn't do science. It's a one time stunt and the stunt is about over.

Too bad, it could have been useful.

Re:And for what?

[geckipede]

The most important result we've got from it so far is practical experience in keeping people alive in a closed microgravity environment in the long term. That's not enough to justify the cost, but it shouldn't be forgotten.

I'm also hopeful that the talk of an orbit change for it towards the end of the construction phase turn out to be true. One of the major reasons why it's just a science platform rather than the practical orbital staging area for more ambitious projects that sci-fi always told us space stations would be is its silly orbit. It's very low and at a high inclination, partly so that Soyuz flights can reach it, which makes it useless for holding components of multi-launch assembled-in-space missions. To go from the ISS's current orbit to a transfer orbit to any of the fun places in the solar system would take a significant fraction of the fuel needed to launch in the first place.

Re:Pee

[Darth_brooks]

What'll really blow your mind is the amount of recycled T-rex farts you breath on a daily basis.

Re:How much does it weigh in space?

[IWannaBeAnAC]

I take it you don't count gravity as a "force" where you come from?

Ahh, this is where relativity and the equivalence principle come in. According to the equivalence principle, there is no experiment that you can do on the ISS that can distinguish whether it is currently in orbit around the Earth, or instead in deep space (not anywhere near any significant masses), or any other variant of 'free fall'. Well, obviously you can look out the window, but that is not what I mean: you cannot determine the force on you due to gravity by doing any kind of experiment with masses etc. (This experiment is easy to do on the surface of the earth, you just need a set of scales!).

Without gravity applying a "force" to the ISS, it would move in what is commonly known as a "straight line".

Yeah true, that is entirely correct in the Newtownian view. But an entirely equivalent way of viewing the motion of the ISS is that it is moving 'straight', but the spacetime surrounding the Earth is curved. This view is easier to grasp if you imagine actually being on the ISS - from this point of view (which is an accelerating reference frame, in Newton's picture), there is no net force acting on it. That is, there is no experiment that you can do to measure the local strength of Earth's gravity.

Another example of motion (acceleration) being equivalent to gravity: Suppose I applied a force to you by putting you in a car and accelerating very quickly down the freeway, you would feel the forces acting upon you. If you attempted to measure the force of gravity at the same time (for example, by using a set of scales, or an accelerometer) there is no way you can distinguish whether I am accelerating you down the freeway, or if you are actually stationary but have been suddenly transported to another planet where the gravity is stronger. This is the Equivalence Principle (I am too lazy to put in the wikipedia link, but the article is reasonably accurate and worth reading).

In orbit, the acceleration of the motion precisely cancels out with the force due to gravity. The net force experienced by the astronauts is zero and they are weightless. The equivalence principle states that this situation is precisely equivalent to being in empty space with no gravitational masses anywhere nearby in the sense that it is not possible to distinguish these cases by measuring the local gravitational field. In both cases, it is zero. Similarly, it is impossible to distinguish, by measuring the local gravitational field, between the two cases of (1) a stationary object on the Earth, experiencing a weight of mass*9.81m/s^2, and (2) a rocket ship in free space with the engines on and accelerating at 9.81m/s^2. In both situations, you have the same mass and any experiment you do to measure the strength of the local gravitational field will give the same reading. [*]

[*] Actually, you can tell, but it is very subtle: on the Earth, the gravitational force is towards the center of the earth, so of you move slightly to the left the direction of the gravitational force changes slightly. But in an accelerating rocket, the force is uniform. These are called 'tidal forces', and with a careful experiment you could measure it. You would see this, for example, in an elevator that is accelerating downwards at exactly the rate of the acceleration due to gravity (so that objects in the elevator were weightless and floating around), and you placed two objects some distance apart, the tidal forces would tend to push them together. This is because they are both accelerating towards the center of the earth, rather than straight down. It is easier if you imagine doing this experiment on a very small and very heavy asteroid. If you put an elevator nearby to the asteroid, and draw lines of force radiating outwards from the center of the asteroid, the lines of force that pass through the elevator are not quite parallel.