How To Deorbit The International Space Station Safely
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- Опубліковано 11 лис 2021
- The International Space Station may one day be forced to return to Earth, so that it safely burns up over the ocean, and this is actually a surprisingly complicated task given the huge mass of the station and the limited propulsion available.
The plans aren't final by any means, but this discusses the problems and one particular option using multiple progress spacecraft to augment the propulsion and propellent available for deorbiting this historic orbital facility.
Some diagrams and figures are from the paper
"ISS CONTROLLED DEORBIT: CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS"
Rafail Murtazina, Evgeny Menkinb, Charles Gray, Alexander Ovchinnikovd, Konstantin Grigorjeve
www.researchgate.net/publicat...
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There's always the "Skylab Maneuver":
Step 1: Evacuate the station
Step 2: Wait
Step 3: Pay littering fine to Australia
NASA still owes the town of Meekathara that $300 fine the county billed them for littering last time. I reckon we shoud insist on pre-payment this time. Though I don't know which country to send the bill to though - the ISS has bits from all around the world.
I'd prefer to sue them until their eyes bleed.
@@kenoliver8913 The $300 fine is new to me, but there was also a $400 fine (IIRC), I think from another town, that was eventually paid by donations from a radio station's listeners.
@@kenoliver8913that was paid like 20 years later, ppl got together and funded it
I helped design parts of the ISS, and I was on console in the Engineering Support Room when it was being assembled. It is my baby in so many ways. I'm *really* not looking forward to it ending. All that said - great topic! I think there is a significant possibilityt that many modules may be reused, either by Axiom or some other entity. I'm hoping these commercial stations can get operational in time to take advantage of the parts of the ISS that still have life in them!
@ProjectsBlack Hell yes! Somebody will do something with it at some point.
You could always list it on eBay for spare parts? Pick up required?
@@ancientbuilds3764 2-day delivery by SpaceX🤣
@@ancientbuilds3764 "Drop shipping"
Costs aside... how could you safely bring the entire ISS back to earth without burning up during re-entry... ie docking sufficent boosters etc
As Indiana Jones would say: "IT BELONGS IN A MUSEUM!" Seriously though, I can't believe they're just going to let it burn up. It's one of mankind's greatest achievements and a key moment in our becoming a spacefaring species. Just put it in a parking orbit, and in due course it will become a huge tourist attraction. Destroying it would come to be seen as an act of vandalism on the scale of blowing up the Great Pyramid or the Taj Mahal.
Maybe we can convince Elon to fix it up with a couple of Starships? Those should be ready soon enough!
I mean... To be fair, there's a big difference between the ISS and the Pyramids. Yes, it's a technological marvel and a Hallmark to mankind's achievements... But the Pyramids aren't an obstacle. They sit there in the desert, and you don't have to look out your window hoping they are still where you left them.
Even if the ISS were to be moved to a high orbit to be preserved, there's still the chance that something can go wrong. A chance that grows more and more likely as time passes.
Say the unthinkable happens, and the abandoned station gets struck by a meteor, or other unforseen debris in a high orbit. You're talking about a debris field that would, with modern technology, leave traveling beyond it's scope a hazard for centuries.
The ISS is something that absolutely deserves to be preserved, but it's also not worth endangering the future of space flight over.
@@YodaIzChaos considering that the Turks (I think) used the Pyramid for trebuchet practice hundreds of years ago, who knows.
i agree fully. same thing for Hubble. The Hubble Space Telescope is so pivotal to much of our knowledge of the universe that the decision to just let it burn up in the atmosphere seems sacrilegious and disrespectful.
Oh yeah, because that would be _super easy_ wouldn't it!
Not like we have to worry about fuel and developing rockets to accelerate the whole thing!
It's not like the ISS is heavy as fuck!
And what's space debris?
I'd love to see a video about what it would take both practically and politically to get the iss into a parking orbit.
Starship and b̶r̶i̶b̶e̶s̶ lobbying?
I concur. We are at the point of in space recycling or repurposing what is already in orbit. If nothing else, it would make a fine starting point for eventually building a space elevator if pushed up to geosynchronous orbit, and eventually be run out as the initial core of the counterweight that would require after using it as the staging area to build the in space facility to manufacture the elevator.
@@RaymondScheel Not invented by but well developed by Arthur C. Clarke in The Fountains of Paradise (1979.)
462 TONS of metals and technology, so wasteful!
We could always sell it to China for scrap, might get a couple hundred Yuan for it
The ISS has been up there literally as long as I can remember, it's a historically significant structure, don't let it burn!!!!
Do NOT LET it burn!
The ISS is not as insignificant as the Space Shuttle. It's a symbol, it means something.
Let's tell that to all the scientistic barbarians. It's a beacon of all that is good about the human spirit. If we destroy it so will our spirit of coming together as a species and building the best stuff in the Universe up there in earth's back yard.
they should dismantle it, like they build it, and then bring it down piece by biece (Starship probably could do it, and the Space Shuttle was able to do it)
Raising it to 1000 kilometers sounds like the best plan
@@WetaMantis The idea is to make way for something new. I hate to say this but it won't stay where it is forever without help.
@@hrissan That also would take a great deal of thrust.
The most expensive thing humans have ever created, and once it runs out of life, it will go out in an extremely large blaze of glory.
Preferably a blaze of glory somewhere in the middle of the Pacific!
@@dillonvandergriff4124 Preferably on top of my head. Let me end it like that
It depends on how you define "thing". There have definitely been more expensive projects, like the Eisenhower Interstate System.
@@General12th Probably physical objects?
A Viking funeral
I think they should park higher up on earth orbit as some sort of space relic for future generations. Imagine how cool it would be for interplanetary humans to visit the OG international space station. I think it's one of the most beautiful things we've ever done as a species, more special than any work of art.
Morning Scott- What's the threat to the ISS from this Russian space junk on the news this morning? Altitudes and possible conflicts...Thanks Juan.
well,he put up a vid on it,so deffanatly check it out.but I would say mostly it's going to be the potential of passing through the debris over the next few years.even the tiny bits we can't pick up can punch holes in things with the speeds they have.all we can do is hope for the best and wish those brave souls the best of luck up there.i personally feel that what Russia did was extremely irresponsible, and they should be held accountable for it.not only did it potentially put the iss in harm's way,but it also potentially will impact future luanches,as well as possibly damage satilites already up there.this could cause more debris.all of this could happen,or none of it,but either way,what Russia did has long term consiquinces.
I feel like the debris would not be that much of an issue currently. There is such great distance between everything up there.
@@splintmeow4723 Then you need to research more because it's a very real threat that could impact our modern lives in many many ways
@@vivecald-vehk6978 that would be good, I like the old ways 😌
@@splintmeow4723 yeah that's oversimplified a bit there bud
A sad, but still pretty cool, topic. Can we look forward to a video on Mir's reentry in the future?
I'm not 100% sure but I think Mr. Manley already did that. Sadly there is only one video of Mir re-entering.
Wait.. is Mir still up there?
I though it was long gone...
I think Scott Manley talked about it hitting a target and everybody got no free meal because it missed.
@@youkofoxy No it came down in the 90's.
When I read your comment, I thought you were saying that Mir was going to come down in the future. I see I wasn't the only one.
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It seems to me that the best approach would be to turn the ISS into a Ship of Theseus. Deorbit modules that are past their useful life and replace them with new, better ones. Eventually all the old ISS will be gone, but you'd get maximum use out of each part instead of having to build a whole station from scratch each time you need to replace it.
Ideally you'd build some inflatable heat shields to actually allow recovery of modules to put them in museums.
That sounds like a dandy idea to be honest. Get to have the station as a bit of history assembled in a museum some day, and you get to do well. The infinitely more efficient thing.
That's a great idea except for parts that everything has to share in common like the main module or core. It's not so easy to replace that.
That's a great idea except for parts that everything has to share in common like the main module or core. It's not so easy to replace that.
With that said, selling it to a private company would be the only way this could happen. And you'd have to get all involved countries to sign off on that. Probably won't happen sadly.
you would need to launch the core of ISS2 then transfer the modules you wanted to keep over to it.
“How to deorbit the international space station?”
Russia - “hold my vodka”
Made my day!
Oh no don't let them do it. I don't want millions of pieces of space debris on missile impact!
You'll actually want to transition it into a much more elliptical orbit, so that when it comes time to reenter, it does so at a much steeper angle, thereby creating a much smaller target area and debris footprint.
He mentioned this
Even though this won’t happen for about a decade I’m still not emotionally prepared
Seems like there would be useful material in the Station which would be better to re-purpose for future space projects since we spent so much money to get all of that material up there.
I certainly agree with you on that, for sure!
Yes I am to hopfully we are trading the ISS for a moon base or somthing simulay awsome
@@richhagenchicago The Station is really old, many of its parts would only cause problems if you tried reincorporating them into other projects. And we're not yet at the level of space industrialisation where you can scrap a satellite and melt it down to raw materials that can be built into sth else
This is of course nothing to say of the fact that it's in a very specific inclination and won't be easily accessible from other LEOs
I hope that by the time it's ready to be decomissioned that startship is cheap enough to dissasemble it and return it to earth. It would be great to have in a museum. But that would cost $$$.
Sad. I'm all for attaching ion engines once decertified and easing it to a LaGrange point. There, to become a world heritage museum for future generations. For that alone, it's worth saving.
Some things are worth saving and the iss is up there with preserving apollo landing sites
Yeah, even if saving the entire station isn't viable, splitting apart the station and saving some of the more important modules such as Zvezda, the Canadarms, and such then dumping the less significant parts would be fine
I was going to suggest a LaGrange point as well. But, I don't know how much fuel it would to get there. And once there, it would need propellant for station keeping.
@@shawnerz98 Somebody has already done the math. You need ~4 km/sec delta-V to get to L4/L5, plus some to slow for insertion. At that point, on human time scales, station keeping should handle itself.
That would be very bad idea since it would render the specific LaGrange point unusable for any other vessel to do manoeuvres in. Just imagine having a big uncotrollable vessel in front of a busy shipping line on the sea. Bad things will happen. And it's not exactly trivial to get the station out of there when needed anymore.
Thankyou for referencing the paper. Too many youtubers misinterpret papers and then never post them to avoid scrutiny.
I love you and your videos Dr. Manley. Thank you
2:37 I think you made a mistake here. You actually want to target the perigee, so that is is over western Europe, to increase the likelihood of pieces landing in my backyard.
It crash on Paris.... I saw the film...
Disappointed when toilet lands in back yard...
@@ancientbuilds3764 oh 💩 there goes the neighborhood
SCOTT - I love how you ALWAYS choose the best footage - the shadow of the shuttle moving across the ISS is such an awesome sight. Watched a lot of shuttle flyarounds, but haven't seen this before - you rock! ... always great when you share and explain some of your favorite footage. Especially long takes.
Totally reading my mind
He aint gonna reply dude..
timecode plz.
@@cubertmiso right at the start on the left lower solar panels
@@MichaelOfRohan don’t see any expectation of a reply. But he does read a fair few of the comments.
Great video! You answered a lot of questions that were burning a hole in my brain.
Things I never thought about that I'm glad I know now. Thank you, Scott. :D
Can you do a video on alternative end life scenarios for the ISS? Such as boosting it to a graveyard orbit for future archeologists to visit.
I’d like a video like that. I heard talk about handing it over to commercial users too. Would it be possible to add new modules to the station and de-orbit only old obsolete modules, as a possible future, for example? 🤔
Putting it from 400km to the graveyard orbit would be prohibitively expensive.
@@jessemahussier180 how much more expensive would it be than safely deorbiting it?
@@monty58 a lot. Raising its orbit requires a specifically designed craft to get into orbit then match up ekth the iss orbit attach to it and raise the total orbit. That's a risky and expensive process. Deorbit in comparison is significantly cheaper as you send up a craft to get anything you want and to bring up more fuel for the ISS then you plug in the course and leave. It will take care of the rest
@@barneystinson2781 the currently on board propellant isn’t enough to get it safely away from earth to the point it won’t come back? Or at least buy 5 10 years time?
I say turn the ISS into a "flat earth" museum just to prove a point.
Oh you precocious GlobeHeads! Everyone knows we're inside a dome, and the sun is a big light. Let's not even get started on the ice wall, or how space is fake.
I know the original comment is sarcastic but the second 🤷♂️
Dude you cannot even use points to end sentences. Rounder earth conspiracy theorists will only scream at your low IQ suggestion.
@@Double_Vision That's good sarcasm.... right?
RIGHT!?
@@CT5555_ ...did you not detect the dripping sarcasm?
The end of the ISS is unbelievably sad, it was a testimony to a time when the US, Former Soviet Union, Europe and other nations came together to work together to build something remarkable, better than any one could have done on their own. It was a symbol of what could be done and a bright future. Unfortunately with the rise of Nationalism and commercial interests I doubt we'll ever see it happen again.
they should at least preserve some parts and bring them back to earth to have them at a museum or something
This is an important reason why the ISS should be declared to be a UNESCO World Heritage Site: it is a great cultural achievement in addition to a technological milestone. Every country that has provided equipment or astronauts to the project should want to memorialize their contribution. UNESCO has provided funding and organizational support to other large international projects such as the restoration of Angkor in Cambodia and the Wieliczka Salt Mine in Poland. It could provide a focus for engineering the development of a booster to place the ISS into a high orbit that could last for thousands of years. As an uncrewed historical site, concerns about radiation from the Van Allen belts would be unimportant.
Yeah. It feels like this is the tail end of the public space mission and international cooperation.
A pleasure to watch as always
Hullo Scott! My daughter hears your voice and always runs up to me saying “rocket ship/Space man!…I want to watch with you.”
Edit: My daughter is only 3.5 years old.
That's wholesome.
Being interested in space as a youngin may mean you have a future engineer on your hands! Wish the absolute best for you and your daughter
Protect that daughter with your life. She's the future of our species.
Hahaha, my daughter used to call it “Scott-manly-fly-safe”!
That's adorable.
I think it's a great achievement, and should be put into a graveyard orbit. History is important, and it'd be a shame if the ISS was forgotten.
I agree with this take. Either that or a gradual deconstruction with the pieces brought safely to Earth for reassembly in a museum. By no means pragmatic whatsoever but certainly intriguing.
How costly would that be energetically amd financially?
@@mythreepants to bring it back to earth, it's probably prohibitively expensive, and would require a new rocket system. Boosting it would probably require a few fuel resupply runs, but I think it'd be doable for not too much money
@@mythreepants Its orbit now is so close that it would take a lot to break it free from Earth however it could be put so far away that using it wouldnt be practicle.. but the farther you go effectively the more real estate there is. Like think how big the Earth surface is, in a high orbit it is easier and easier to avoid getting in the way of other objects.
@@shadowrunner2323 the graveyard orbit is the better idea. As a race we should be pushing *into* space, not back. We push it up to a parking orbit and replace it with multiple commercial stations. Then in a few decades we can hopefully refurbish it once we have a decent space economy and infrastructure. Then
Make it a museum that you can visit in space!
Hey Scott, I wanted to ask about that graph at 5:20 in the video. I am part of a team that has been doing some research with a small 2U satellite and I have noticed a similar pattern for the altitude of the satellite in both GMAT predictions and also in telemetry from the satellite. Our satellite was launched from the ISS, which leads me to believe the high inclination (very similar to that of the ISS) of the satellite has something to do with this undulation in altitude. From what I've gathered, this high inclination causes nodal precession with a period of about 60 days (for this inclination), and I believe this is what is causing the undulations. If you could offer any insight into this that would be greatly appreciated. Thanks : )
Could it be related to the position of the moon (or sun)? On some days the satellites will be going towards and away from the moon on an orbit, accelerating and decelerating accordingly. On other days they stay roughly the same distance away from the moon throughout each orbit, since it will be near the axes of their orbits. I'm totally guessing here btw, I have no expert knowledge in this area.
@@ninjabob2456 I don't think so. The moons orbit is over a 27 day period, and simulation and real world data estimate the period to be about 60 days. The moon also has very little gravitational influence compared to the earth at such a close distance. Thanks for the suggestion, I will look into it, but I don't think this is what is causing it. Thanks for the thoughtful reply nonetheless.
Cool thoughts. I like the parking orbit idea for space museum.
the thought of dumping the ISS into the ocean has always made me sad.
NASA’s ISS, promised for $8 million, cost over $200 billion yet produced no significant or meaningful science, exploration or technology.. another NASA pork dead end boondoggle. Real space science, observation & research requires a still, clean, quiet environment incompatible with humans. Imagine the good for humanity we could have done with $200 billion.. feed the poor, cure cancer, green energy, could have funded hundreds of thousands of PHDs & fruitful research.
@@warrenwhite9085 nice bait
@@Niall3roflcopterz “There is no way you could justify the vast sums the have been spent on building the ISS,” said the astronomer royal, Sir Martin Rees. “For a start, the scientific returns have been meagre. We have learned a bit about how the body reacts to spending long periods in space, and we have grown a few crystals in zero gravity, but that is in no way commensurate to the tens of billions of dollars that have spent on the ISS. Really, the station only makes news when its toilets get blocked or an astronaut sings while floating about with a guitar.”
@@warrenwhite9085 UA-cams moronic new system of not counting down votes means we cant see your true score any more. But just to note - I voted you down.
@@warrenwhite9085 200 billion might feed the the poor of the whole world for a year then what? It would not be enough to end cancer either.
I imagine the day the ISS deorbits will be a very emotional day for all of the astronauts who visited it and especially those who spent hours working on it
Hours? Try years.
Thanks for the info man I’ll be sure to use it like I mean USE it
That would be insane to think about this just being burnt up.. amazing video thank you! :)
Now, the dispersion pattern of debris being decelerated by their respective atmospheric drag characteristics and weight is something every KSP player can attest to... while tears run down their cheeks and words like "I forgot to F5" are uttered, I presume.
I'd love to see the ISS being turned into some sort of space-museum or monument or something. It's a shame it's such a hassle to keep them around and they do pose quite some threat, but it's just a shame that all these iconic milestones of our early spaceflight will be lost to gravity one day...
Well, keeping a more solid and small chunk of it would be safer.
However it doesn't seem like worth the hassle.
You realise that the ISS is actually used for science up there, right?
@HylanderSB No. Putting stuff up there was important, useful and pioneered new knowledge, skills and technology. Putting stuff up there isn't hubris or audacity, it's progress.
@@h.a.9880 My comment was actually directed at @HylanderSB but youtube on mobile seems to always remove the @tag.
@@hawkanonymous2610 Ah I see, I was wondering a bit about it.
Fascinating, Scott! I worked on the Station project for 10 years back in the 80's/90's and hope she has as graceful an end as we can give her.
Something I've always daydreamed about. At the end of the station's lifespan, install a little nuclear power unit that will kick on once the solar panels are no longer able to get enough power. Pack the station with basically like Crash Test Dummies but for space. Whole array of various sensors. Plus I a long-range Beacon. Then just slowly push it out of our solar system. It doesn't need to be in a hurry, if it takes 100 years to exit our solar system then so be it.
You can pack a lot equipment onto that thing and it moving so slowly through our system could provide insight to things that are other probes may not have noticed. During the transit through our solar system we can use it tracking objects and various readings being recorded. If and hopefully the station will get hit by some kind of space debris. We can see how the space test dummies Fair which themselves will be packed full of sensors and recording everything. If or when the station leaves our solar system we can use the long-range Beacon to see how our solar system is moving throughout this galaxy. The possibilities are just endless. Who knows perhaps 100,000 years from now there is some alien species out there and just like us they are asking themselves why have we not seen any other intelligent life forms. Until one day they discover our station floating along and they say.. oh shit dude, check that thing out.
How does a little nuclear power unit provide any thrust to do what you suggest? It's got solar panels for electrical power, chemical rockets for thrust. More electrical power won't keep it up, or drive it outwards.
This kind of mission was already done twice with the Voyager launches. The engineering and delta V to get the ISS into deep space would be insane
As I've had to say over and over, something as seemingly simple as just sending it to the moon would be highly difficult and exorbitantly expensive.
We can't just leave it there either - if we do, it's gonna be a repeat of the Skylab incident on a much grander scale.
Can't bring it down near any specific country either - once again, it's the _International Space Station,_ meaning that if it lands too close to one, other nations are gonna cry foul, hence why the target is point Nemo.
@@RhodokTribesman the Voyager spacecrafts were moving rather quickly. I'm talking about extremely slowly moving out of our system. Instead of massive fuel payloads try small ion drives. Instead of 80 years try 1,000 years. Slow, steady and cheap.
@@doglover31418 the nuclear reactor is not for thrust unless we attached a ion engine to the thing but the reactor is to keep the space station active when it's so far away that can no longer collect solar energy. It has nothing to do with propulsion, for the propulsion we will want something that is very slow and steady and cheap. We want just barely enough escape velocity to leave the system. We want access to this thing for multiple Generations before it leaves our system preferably.
I'd love to see it raised into a high 'museum' orbit so that one day our descendants can go and visit it on their school field trips. That being said I'd gladly pay to go see the reentry fireball!
yeah, cuz by then torching endless holes in the ozone layer will be fixed with a fancy iPhone app by some Web influencers
global wamists will end all space flight, after all the earth has a fever.
@@dave8599 I can't wait for them to cure mortality itself so that all humans and animals turn vegan and eat cannabis for free forever in peace and harmony
@@edsnotgod why would you want to eat cannabis
@@lucasteroni6097 animals dont typically smoke, smoke is CO2 and thats bad, so it stands to reason that humans in tune with nature will stick with pot edibles moving forward
I would love to hear a discussion of what parts of the ISS are actually wearing out. If the pressure vessels are starting to crack, why not strip out the useful equipment into newer bigger modules and then just deorbit the old modules?
russia wants to stop funding eventually so replacing parts wont be possible as there wont be the funds to send new parts up
Because it doesnt work that way. what a waste of energy and time to salvage old equipment when you can spend the same time and money to replace them brand new.
what can be usefull after 10, 15, 20 or 25 years??? basically nothing... thats like saying my 20 years old car have A/C so i buy new car without it and put the old A/C unit in it...
@@ManOnTheRange Well if the AC works perfectly and costs 56 million...
@@benbaselet2026 It would be just cheaper to buy a newer AC wich would cost the same as repairing the old outdated one who's parts are no longuer manufactured
Would love to see a video about boosting ISS (Izzy) to a parking orbit! It would also be interesting to take a look at the "science" behind the "Big Ride" in Seveneves where they boosted it to the orbit of the moon.
Agreed. I'd love to see the math on what it would take to park the ISS.
Is seven eves worth reading?
@@user-lp7tx1fe6t I enjoyed it a lot. Some people don't like the middle section as it has a lot of "slow" political stuff, but that didn't bother me. It's definitely my second favorite Stephenson book after snow crash. The audio version is great too (I've read it and listened to it, lol).
@@user-lp7tx1fe6t It's a very good read. It has a lot of the typical Stephenson intensity, but in others ways is a lot more grounded than most of his other books, at least for most of it. Less random diversions to obscure trivia and a greater focus on the characters.
@@ender4555 personally i hated most parts of the middle section, because it frustrated me so much, it's a good representation of humans to be fair. But i had to take breaks reading because I got so agitated
Still, awesome book
It would be much better to instead propel the ISS higher when its expiration date arrives and leave it there to the commercial sector as a "seed" for new space stations, ideally usable for every country and commercial enterprise. The ISS has enough redundancy built in of the long list of systems and life support that a first module of a space station needs to have, just get rid of all science equipment/modules and keep it as an outpost with the basic systems functional so more modules can be added. A new life as a "mother" of new breed of space stations seems like the best use for it. Eventually it will decay further and lose some redundancy and usefulness, but the oldest of its "offspring" can take its role, and become a relic. Then kick it to a graveyard orbit or ideally use it for raw materials for a new orbit-based industry. There's never the need to reenter the ISS
Your forgetting that space is very hostile to our technology, its filled with radiation of both lowish energy (from the sun) and crazy energy (comic rays, aka protons and helium nuclei moving at relativistic speeds). Not to mention how metals grow hairs under vacuum that can short circuit and fry motherboards and the random blobs of brown water they routinely find behind panels that are filled with enhanced microbes, because of course bacteria prefer micro gravity which is harmful to humans.
I know that i would not choose a core that is 24 years old now and by the time it would be used for your purposes will probably be approaching 30 to start the project, that just sounds like a ticking time bomb, much better to start fresh.
Simply put it would be obsolete and hazardous if you tried to save it as a seed for some hypothetical space station.
We all love the ISS but just like Skylab it will eventually need to fall out of the sky, the best case scenario is they save a piece to put in a replica in a museum like the Smithsonian or Kennedy Space center's tourist areas.
The problem actually is that it is those support systems on the ISS that are the oldest and are breaking down, and despite the myth no, it does not actually have much redundancy for those. (only emergency ones) In space redundancy is very limited because of the extra weight and support every redundancy would need.
It would make little sense to use the oldest parts of the ISS for newer space stations whose core would depend on having reliable, up-to-date support systems in place.
Would think putting it in a stable much higher orbit where it could be used as a lifeboat in case of a problem on other missions.
Lifeboat in case of problems on the planet? Not many tickets available however 😉
It should be kept as a historical place in my opinion. Put it in a graveyard orbit, so future generations can visit.
What???? You clearly don't understand how volatile and degrading space is to equipment. Future generations? there would be nothing left to visit other than a tin can with holes in it from all the cosmic particles. Space will never become an amusement park for people like you to tour around in. Get real.
I agree. All that time money and engineering should be used to preserve it till the rich guy with the big frigging rockets can bring it back as a physical memory of 20+ years of political and engineering achievement of the 20th century.
@@tylermcnally8232 Plus, It could take a huuge part in a kessler syndrome.
The only viable 'graveyard' orbit is beyond geosynchronous orbit...over 22,000 km altitude. Not going to happen for ISS.
Youd just make more debries
The ISS will degrade overtime, at most you could get 10 more years of use
Personally, I'd plug the thing with as many instrument packages as possible, and use it on one of the leading or trailing lagrange points. You have your museum, and a massive automated science station.
You know how far away any of the lagrange points are from LEO? The amount of delta v needed to push the ISS to any of the lagrange points is effectively impossible to achieve
#savetheISS
Erm, presuming you mean a lunar Lagrange point, getting there takes about 4km/s of delta-V. If the 100m/s needed for deorbit is hard, then 4km/s is impossible.
Just moving the ISS a couple hundred kilometers up to a more stable orbit would take a lot of fuel. Forget getting it to the Lagrange point
The only thing I could even remotely think of would be maybe if you had 1000s of fully-fueled starships that would all dump their delta-V into it one after another.
which is likely also impossible.
The shadow of the shuttle creeping over the station in the opening sequence though. Something very poetic about that to me, yet I'll be buggered if I can find the words.
Thanks! I was just about to go do that
I'd like to see a follow-up video about what it would take to push the ISS into a retirement orbit.
Some ideas.
a) Another poster here mentioned attaching an ION engine to it and using the solar panels to power that.
b) I'd was wondering if SpaceX could put a Starship into orbit, refuel it with tankers, and then attach a fully fueled Starship to it to push it into the retirement orbit. I'm sure many things to consider, but would that in theory provide enough delta-v?
Far too much thrust, the solar arrays would probably break off
Great video Scott. I would enjoy seeing a video about raising the ISS to a parking orbit instead and why is that not an option considered (or is it)? What would be involved, what are the costs of doing this and how high would a safe parking orbit be? I love the idea about people one-day being able to visit this amazing achievement in the far future.
Seconded, this is a really interesting topic to explore. What are the pros and cons? Is it simply more costly, or is it more challenging somehow? What would that take?
I was waiting for a discussion of this in your video. A rough delta V and propellant calculation would be useful to know.
My intuition is that it would take more fuel to get it high enough that drag is negligible than to deorbit it.
Sounds like a safer option. Too many things to go wrong with trying to bring it down. Rocket motors can fail.
Back of the napkin calculations tell me a fully re-fueled Starship has the delta-V to push it beyond a geosynchronous orbit, but really it doesn't need to go that far to avoid significant orbital decay. A circular orbit at 900km would be enough to keep it in orbit for about 1,000 years; one above 2000km probably wouldn't come down before the oceans evaporate.
Your video is excellent Scott. Started me thinking, why not slowly accelerate the ISS to escape velocity once it is deserted? Then I thought, could any of it be used for the trip to Mars. A quick Google searched ended the second fantasy, but I’d like your opinion on the idea of not bringing it down, but rather sending it on the long journey into space or maybe some orbit high enough it won’t decay. I’m obviously no rocket scientist, which is why I love your content.
an episode on flywheels and theyre uses + possible future uses would be nice
Thanks for the tutorial, will try tomorrow
LOL
Noooooo! That's way too soon.
Given the energy it took to boost all that stuff up there, it would be nice if we could park the ISS and use it for parts.
Yeah, but the oldest module there was made in 1998, so only the newer modules would have any good chance of being reused
I doubt there’s anything worth salvaging in ISS. ISS is basically Cold War-era relic.
@@aconite72 kinda.
@@aconite72 there's a lot of high grade metal alloys. The tech we have available now, means that the next station to be build, can be assembled using drones and 3d printing. Then all you need is to come up with a craft that can convert the metal in the station into a state that the 3d printer can use.
At around 3 million dollars per ton put into orbit (if you fx used Falcon 9 rockets) having a couple hundred ton of various metals in orbit already is highly valuable - granted that the recycling process doesn't end up costing more than deorbiting + replacing.
I figured the idea was to keep adding to one side while dropping older or defective parts off. Continuous updating.
00:04 Long take starts; part of shadow of shuttle wing on rightmost panel of the left solar array
00:20 Shadow of "nose" of shuttle touches the module to the right of the left solar array
00:31 Shadow of open payload doors visible on station module to right of left solar array
Imagine shuttles disassebling it and bringing it back to earth
We have starship for that
Yes, but why would anyone do that? Sounds wasteful economically and for the environment. More like recycling plastics meme.
I suspect the shuttle was not actually capable of returning the modules from orbit safely. It already had pretty bad aerodynamics, a lot more weight isn't going to help anything.
@kuroryuu010 starships whole point is being able to put 100 tons of cargo onto the martian or lunar surface, let's be generous and take half of that, still more than enough for even the heaviest modules
@@danieljensen2626 the shuttle frequently took damaged satellites down to earth, also afaik, none of its abort modes involved jettisoning the payload, so it would have had to land WITH an ISS module if things went south anyways
Disassemble by starting from the most redundant elements/dead weight to lower total mass then hook those up to relatively small tugs for deorbit individually. Might be too expensive though. Additionally something like SS chomper would be great for returning modules to Earth but one can’t count on something like that being available before deorbit is necessary
I say boost the orbit, so I can start a space salvage company. To recycle materials used by my 3d printer ship making new satellites and ships. Man i hope we actually get to that point someday.
The ISS can't be dissassembled without maybe years of work. Modules are not undockable like resupply ships are, and there are bolts, rails, wires, etc joinging them.
I wonder how much works has been put into figuring out how to build a progress as a pure tug: launch at max weight for the mission profile with it all being fuel. I'm guessing there is more volume than needed for that but the trick would be adding the tanks and plumbing. What about the same thing with other existing resupply platforms? What about something custom?
Or how about ship up a bigger rocket attached to a docking adapter and a big fuel bladder to set up inside? With that you could tanker up as much storable propellant as you need. Once you are done with people living on the ISS there shouldn't be much of an issue with fuel hoses and tanks being in the "habitable" space regardless of what fuel is used.
@@1312_PV It can be disassembled in much less than a year.
Put a couple tons of C-4 (det-cord), properly distributed, all over the station. Then blow it when it starts to break up below 100km.
This makes sure every part of the station has similar drag coefficients and so will land predictably.
Not sure if anything will even make it to the ground.
@@cbboegh That does not relate to the OP comment. Using explosives when it is already that low is pointless IMO, there hard thing is getting there.
I'M NOT READY FOR THIS!!!!
Very interesting. Given the risks, has anybody looked at your initial suggestion - of boosting it to a higher parking orbit?
"The Kraken has stowed away on Dragon"
And you wanna bring that thing back to Earth? NUKE IT I SAY!
nuke it ... you want Kessler syndrome ?
@@OverlordZephyros i think its a KSP joke
@@OverlordZephyros you want space kraken affecting earth rockets?
@@michagrill9432 It is, but we have Kessler syndrome in KSP too. It mostly affects finding stuff in the tracking station, but I'm pretty sure it could seriously impact loading the game on a low-mid power PC. The game's got its good points, but sometimes I wish it was made with the software engineering skills of the Minor Planets Center, which in the mid-90s was tracking 30-40,000 objects with a surprisingly low budget for the time.
*_Furiously taking notes_*
The tutorial I’ve been looking for
Possible storyline:
SpaceX is contracted by NASA and it's international partners to provide fuel and towing to de-orbit the ISS.
Using a Starship, SpaceX attempts to dock with the ISS and begin an early de-orbit burn. The launch goes well and Starship makes it way towards the ISS, docks and prepares to begin a de-orbit burn.
Then, a call goes out at mission control "Starship, your attitude is off. You need to make adjustments before your burn." There is no response from Starship. Mission control repeats their call "Starship, you need to correct you attitude before your burn."
Suddenly two objects appear on radar, they are Starships. The flight director at mission control says "What the hell is going on?"
The two crafts dock with the ISS.
Everyone is panicked and confused at mission control when a figure appears in the doorway, saying "We'll take it from here.".
The flight director yells at him "What's the meaning of this?! Who the hell are you?" The figure steps into the light, it's Elon Musk.
"I said, we'll take it from here." says Elon. Just then armed men enter the room followed by several flight controllers, who takes the seat of bewildered NASA flight controllers.
All three Starships ignite their engines and the orbit of the ISS begins to rise.
The flight director says "Why, why are you doing this?" Elon Musk calmly responds "Reusability."
A flight controller sitting at a screen says "If they continue at this acceleration... he's creating an encounter with Mars."
The flight director, "Good god, man. Why?" Elon, without looking away from the screens, as a tear rolls down his face, he whispers
"... reusability"
I'm with you! Let's get them to move the ISS out to a LaGrange point! That way space tourists in the future can have something to float around in, sort of like sinking battleships to make reefs for divers to explore!
How about de-orbiting it in sections? That would require a smaller change in delta-v per module and possibly be easier to control. 🤔
Larger total needed, since not all modules are capable of independent maneuvering or control. It also doesn't remove the issues associated with orbital maintenance of the whole as sections are removed.
You would need to send a service/propulsion module for each part.
@@Videoman2000 Just a big enough fuel tank and A KLAW!
@@Videoman2000 A single propulsion module can deorbit a section, let go and fly up to grab the next section 1 or 2 orbits later. Deorbiting itself last.with strategically placed batteries and separation mechanisms, the later sections can be kept under control for the few orbits needed to put each part into point NEMO, without the need for working solar arrays.
The ISS was never designed to be taken apart. There are multiple connections between every module and no one knows if the modules have vacuum welded themselves together.
3 Progress can deorbit the whole station. Why try to split it up.
We should send it up into the deep space. This is precious artifact; it should be preserved for the future generations to explore.
Going into a much higher Apogee before bringing down the Perigee could decrease the length of the debris track. I suspect that would require much more fuel however.
Another option is to pro-actively de-orbit individual modules separately.
I guess it would require much more fuel, you are right. But it is much much safer.
Very interesting, I'm sure it will be quite the spectacle when this thing comes down. However the kraken hanging out in Dragon wobbling it about had me giggling like an idiot 😄
The wobble was funny but what's the kraken reference?
@@neithere "The kraken" in this context, applies to the physics glitch in Kerbal Space Program. In that game if you ever have a spacecraft that just shakes itself to destruction for no reason because of physics errors then it's said that you had, "a Kraken attack" or, "the Kraken got you" for example. The Dragon spacecraft in Scott's video that is wobbling for no reason is an example of a Kraken-style physics error.
@@Jimbits. thank you!
@@neithere No problem 👍
Strictly speaking, it's an achievement of the *20th* Century.
Scott :- How to deorbit the ISS
Russia :- Hold my Beer.
Thanks, I was wondering how to decommission my ISS
Me and my girlfriend watch you Scott! There's a sentence I never thought I'd say! Thanks for making my Friday nights
Have they thought about doing this whilst playing the Interstellar music? That’s got to provide all the Delta-V that you could need right?
what a tearjerker that will be. good idea.
The space nerd's equivalent of "Stickers add more horsepower"
The way orbital mechanics work in Interstellar maybe go faster stripes would also help.
@@Lucien86 don't diss it if you don't know how it works
Scott, you said "I'm sure there a lot of engineers who have given this a lot of thought". I still live in the world of maintaining and upgrading old school unix systems to a certain extent still because I am "legacy" myself and I need to say, the idea of engineers giving a lot of thought to handling end of life for systems is just that... an idea for the most part. I am sure the ISS is managed better than the legacy unix systems I am talking about but it sure would be nice to have confirmation that there is a plan in place for deorbiting the ISS.
Plan is to send to Point Nemo - farthest point on the planet from any habitable area.
Believe me, nobody wants a repeat of the Skylab incident.
you can think of SpaceX what you want but in producing amazing footage, they really changed the game.
Unless you are an astronmomer using a telescope of course.
Shoulda ended it with "I'm Scott Manley, land safe." ;)
Just like Hubble, I'd love for SpaceX to bring ISS home on Starship. I understand ISS would take several trips, but It would be amazing to see both in the Smithsonian.
Indeed, let’s disassemble it and return it to earth in pieces
Nahhh, It would be imposible from the solar pannels and all the parts bolted and soldered to the truss
Hubble would be doable, but not the ISS
I think that if you look into the size of payload Starship can fit into its hull, you'll find out *all* of the hardware is too big to fit. So another SpaceX fantasy bites the dust.
@@AluminumOxide Very low IQ rant. Maybe learn to use capital letters for names and end sentences before you handle who will pay billions for any return?
@@jesusramirezromo2037 Agreed people who cannot end sentences? Actually believe cutting tools do not work in space. Right?
We can see this happen in next 5 years. As starship gets ready for low earth orbit, it will be huge enough for equipment and life support of months. Like a laboratory launching everytime we need it. Like this we can constantly update the equipment too
Finally, my particular skills in KSP are of use in the real world.
A slightly tongue-in-cheek, slightly real question: How much delta-v could you get by controlled release of the station's internal atmosphere and associated gas storage tanks (ala The Martian)? I would image that having the module depressurized for final entry would make their breakup less violent and lead to a smaller debris path
Probably like 1 m/s, it’s just not worth it
ISS internal volume 1k cubic meter, 1 atm air, 1.2 ton. Total station mass 400 ton. If air leaves at 330 m/s, the station will lose ~1 m/s.
I would imagine that having things break up violently is actually desirable, less large intact pieces to make it to the surface.
Have been looking for someone to bring up "The Martian", 'cuz both ships look kinda similar.
What one sees in a Hollywood movie is not "science"... Even less if the flick is supposed to be a 'blockbuster', with big names on the marquee...
Who knows? Maybe we should ask Sandra Bullock for her experience and opinion... She got back to Terra Firma without becoming part of a debris field 8D
Simplest would be to use those airlocks throughout the station, and simply take modules out of service, and use a Progress to control the deorbit of the module or pair of modules, so that you gradually get a smaller station that is easier to control for the last unmanned missions to go up and automatically dock, so they can then have a full fuel load for control.
It's not docked like SST/resupply ships with ISS itself. You can't just "unplug" part from the other just like that. As there is a lot of assembly required after the initial dock/contact, smaller parts and pieces installed around main modules. Maybe it's NASA solution, but for me, it looks like a shitload of work need to be done for safe disassembly, especially with such limited crew, no "shuttle"-like vehicle to fly, do a job and come back, not to mention time/money needed...
@@override7486 correct, the station wasn’t designed for disassembly
There’s also the possibility that the seems have fused together over the time in vacuum which would make it physically impossible to separate them
Very interesting episode. We certainly hope there are "plenty of engineers" who have given this some thought. :)
Eh, just raise the apogee to get within the Moon SOI then perform a Moon gravity assist to crash it vertically into Earth. Worked in KSP ;-)
I was thinking the same. All those big solar panels could run an awesome ion thruster.
Considering cost of moving material to space doesn’t it seem smarter to park it and reuse parts on future space stations.
All of its parts are VERY old
Even Nauka, wich just launched, was built in the 90's
Can't reuse it, far too old and degraded, stuff in space has a lifespan too. Could contribute to Kessler syndrome if we park it
@@deephorizon1365 forget about oustside stuff. I see keyboards. At one pound costs 10,000$ to send up your telling me the keyboards can’t be used? What about toilet they just mailed up? I find it hard to believe we can’t reuse this stuff. In future maybe we can melt down reuse metals. Seems a heck lot of stuff just to be tossed.
@@expertadvice4u Not sure what you think should be done with all that stuff? Deconstructing and transporting it to a new space station sounds like way more unnecessary work than simply building new stuff and launching it up.
@@expertadvice4u the cost of launching stuff to orbit has dropped precipitously, to under $1000 per pound, thanks to SpaceX, and if Starship is successful will drop to $100, maybe $10. Given that and given the difficulty of repurposing anything in orbit, it seems unlikely that it would make sense to try. That said, I think it might make sense to replace/update the station piecemeal, deorbiting each decommissioned component. That would also make it easier to keep any components that actually are reusable.
"How about no"
Let's boost it to a parking orbit, I don't care how much it costs I will pay the price just don't let the damn thing de-orbit
the genius of politicians will decide. so.
@@jamescollier3 and the public will have a say in it if they like it or not, I won't give up on the ISS
" I donnt care how much it costs " and that right there is why we shouldn't let emotion control economics
@@OverlordZephyros agree while it certainly is the most valid point someone could say I would still believe that the ISS staying in orbit would have a better morale boost for space exploration than letting it crash and burn in to the ocean like ordenary trash satellites at the end of their lives
I’m sure NASA accepts your credit card! :-)
Scott, I know it's a long shot, but if you could somehow dock a 2nd stage Falcon to the station, even it's minimal thrust might be enough to provide the force needed to de-orbit the ISS. Of course, if Starship were even in it's testing stage, it could fly a partially fuelled 2nd stage to rendezvous with the station - or dozens of JATO rockets for that matter...
I would put that space station more up, so it could be used many years later as the first "Space Museum" for the space tourists. What do you think about my idea?
That... would be more trouble and way more expensive than it's worth, really.
First off, no matter how many new modules we attach, the heart of the station is still from 1998.
Second, we'd need to bolt superheavy engines to the ISS to get it that far, and it would probably be a one-way trip. The only modern engine we have would be the ones used with the Falcon Heavy, which, as a reminder, is meant to run supply missions to LEO, not boost things out of orbit, nevermind that the things cost about 150 million each.
Can't use the apogee motors either, they don't have the power and were never meant to accelerate the station beyond a small boost to keep it from crashing to the surface.
Thirdly, we'd need to add way more radiation shielding. The ISS is built to withstand the radiation in LEO, putting it out that far would probably fry the systems.
Fourthly, we can't just leave it where it is, either. The _last_ time we did that, Skylab fell on Australia.
I hate to say it, but de-orbiting it to Point Nemo is the best option.
@@anhilliator1 Great answer! Thanks bro!
It honestly sounds like it'd be easier to just boost it up to a parking orbit...
It's a big target. If it gets hit by space debris, that's a lot of new space debris.
@@alex2143 Sounds like a problem that hasnt been a problem for 23 years
@@Peter-nu8st its shifting orbit now to avoid space junk the Chinese shot up.
@@Peter-nu8st Reason being that ISS is currenly actively avoiding debris.
No such thing as “parking” orbit, it comes down eventually
To make the ISS descend quicker through the atmosphere, you could first raise its orbit, then at a higher apogee, do a burn to really get it falling quickly and more accurately.
Do you mean like a bi-elliptical transfer?
while in theory it would work, i think the manouver requires too much extra deltaV because you need to rise apogee a lot to get a relevant change
I was wondering the same thing, and guessed the same deal breaker.
8:09 - What a Kerbal approach to deorbiting! 😍
Scott is one of the best minds in this age
Scott, Is there any case for elevating the orbit of some of the newer more valuable components for later use by another project like in the process of building a NEW station, using old station for temporary use until it can be repurposed/recycled or for sending the materials to the moon for recycling after allowing it to impact an area for study ?
A shame. Ideally, the ISS would be the construction crew quarters for a much larger and longer-lasting station before being disconnected and de-orbited.
They don't bring it down just for the fun of it sir.
Did you not hear what Scott said? If left unattended, the ISS would de-orbit by itself in just two years.
Great vid as always. I have a question, and I dunno if its been asked. What would it take to park the ISS in a stable orbit that would last, say, 20 yrs, without fuel? or would that be too expensive?
As you go higher, orbits become practically permanent. (much less residual atmosphere/ drag)
I'd have to dig out a book, but beyond 1-2000km should last a loooong time, and require less energy than a post- geostationary graveyard orbit.
Maybe we could add colored mylar foil- create a highly visible artificial star as a permanent monument instantly distinguishable from earth.
Stationkeeping is propably required to work against small disturbances, but those should be less of a problem for this huge station.
I'm curious in general lately, and after years working at NASA, about the following, which I think would be a good topic for a video from you. Given the sheer cost of getting ANY sort of mass into space, what is the reasoning for de-orbiting any significant hardware. It seem like spending resources to keep things parked in orbit would be worth it economically. As we extend our human presence in orbit, and in space, I would think the raw materials alone would be worth keeping up there in a controlled manner. In the case of the ISS the metal shell alone should be useful for later retrofit or extension of other things. I mean, they have looked at reusing booster shells as habitats, and they can't be as useful as something with so many docking collars and other useful bits.
As it’s made up of modules, why not de-orbit each module individually?
Because then the debris would be spread over a larger area
@@DerZeldaFan1 not necessarily. You can, if you do it correctly, deorbit each module at a specific point, one at a time, to control where the module falls
@@DerZeldaFan1 Not if you deorbit them at the same True Anomaly, right? I'd have thought at least they could get them all to land in the Pacific graveyard.
@@whoshotdk that was my thought. Drop them all in the 1 spot that’s always used. Seems better than de-orbiting one huge lump. I remember when Mir came down and before that Skylab and it was seriously dodgy as far as where it landed.
Not every module have thrusters for de-orbit.
Easiest and cheapest way may be using a starship as a tug to pull it down. I know docking and center of thrust may be a issue, but we can use ropes instead of docking ports in this scenario. The astronauts and anything we want to keep can come back onboard the starship.
Thanks, this video helped me deorbit my home made space station safely!
Pretty cool. I parking orbit would be cool! in a 100 years tourist wold be able to visit this historic piece of tech!
The ISS also has the title of most expensive "thing" or project, ever in history.
How about just send a few Starships to bring it back intact so it can be put into a museum.
when the iss gets into the atmo, orienting solar panels can assist in orienting the iss. also, I'm guessing the best approach to reentry is to make the orbit more oval first, raise your apogee, then lower the perigee to get a very steep reentry
Scott - nice work putting this together! But what about simply pushing the station away from the earth in some direction? I saw one of the comments mention using the LaGrange points...what about just sending it toward the sun with as much propellant as possible and then consider it decommissioned? If we can’t use it, and we have more than enough trash already on planet Earth...I guess what I'm saying is why bring back trash and further pollute the seas when we can just let it float away into space? Thanks!