NASA chose SpaceX, owned by Elon Musk, to take down the International Space Station at the end of its useful life.
The California-based company will build a vehicle capable of pushing the 430-ton planet-orbiting platform into the Pacific Ocean early next decade.
The contract, worth US$843 million, was announced this Wednesday.
The first elements of the International Space Station were launched into space in 1998, and crewed operations began in 2000.
Engineers say the lab structure remains pretty solidbut what it is necessary to establish plans for its eventual elimination. Without any intervention, the platform would end up falling to Earth on its own, which would pose a considerable risk to the planet’s population.
“Choosing a deorbit vehicle for the International Space Station will help NASA and its international partners ensure a safe and responsible transition into low Earth orbit at the end of station operations,” Ken Bowersox, director of space operations of the organization.
The United States and Russia lead the ISS. Europe, Canada and Japan play supporting roles. Western countries agreed to fund the station until 2030; Russia says its participation will last at least until 2028.
There are plans to establish an international station around the Moon.
NASA has studied several options for disposing of the space station at the end of its useful life, including dismantling the station and using its younger components in a next-generation platform. Another idea has been to simply hand it over to a commercial company for operation and maintenance.
But all of these solutions come with various complications, both in terms of complexity and cost. And then there is the legal problem of having to resolve ownership issues.
Neither NASA nor SpaceX have released the details of the design of the “tug” that will take the International Space Station out of orbit, but this will need a considerable boost to guide it safely into the atmosphere at the right place and time.
The great mass and extension of the platform (it is approximately the size of a football field) means that some structures and components will withstand the heat of reentry and fall to the planet.
The controllers will allow the orbit of the International Space Station to fall naturally over a period of time and, once the last crew has been removed, they will send the tug to execute the final maneuver to leave orbit.
The space debris will be headed to a remote location known as the Pacific Pole of Inaccessibility, or Nemo Point.
Named after the famous underwater sailor from Jules Verne’s book “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea”, it is located more than 2,500 km from the nearest land mass.
NASA hopes that several private consortiums have begun launching commercial space stations by the time the International Space Station disappears from the sky.
The focus of space agencies will now shift to a project to build a platform called Gateway that will orbit the Moon.
