ISS PREPARES FOR COMMERCIAL FUTURE
▶ Twenty years after people began living on the station, private companies are increasingly taking the helm
History was made on November 2, 2000, when two Russian cosmonauts and an American astronaut became the first livein guests on board the International Space Station.
Since that remarkable space journey, the vast station has welcomed no fewer than 241 travellers from 19 countries – including the UAE.
As with any major milestone, the 20th anniversary prompted experts to look to the future of the space station as well as honour its trailblazing past.
There is plenty of discussion about when the ISS, a joint project of space agencies from Canada, Europe, Japan, Russia and the US, will eventually be retired.
The Low Earth Orbit sector, of which the ISS is part, is increasingly commercial, with several private enterprises involved that may one day replace the $150 billion (Dh550.87bn) station.
The increasing role of private companies was demonstrated most dramatically this year by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which took two Nasa astronauts to the ISS at the end of May using a Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket.
Another commercial transportation programme is being developed by Boeing, which has a long history of involvement in the ISS, having been selected by Nasa as its main contractor for the station back in 1993.
Boeing’s attempt in December to send its Starliner spacecraft up to the ISS went awry when a timing problem prevented a planned docking of the crewless vehicle, but another attempt is scheduled for January.
Before then, in the middle of this month, SpaceX is set to take three American and one Japanese astronaut to the ISS on its second crewed mission to the station.
Their arrival will expand to seven the number of people at the ISS, which currently is host to two Russian cosmonauts, Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov, and an American astronaut, Kathleen Rubins. They have been there since mid-October and are due to return to Earth in April.
Speaking from the ISS during a recent question-and-answer session to mark the 20th anniversary, Dr Rubins said the toughest activities they had to undertake were space walks or extravehicular activity (EVA), two of which she completed during her first ISS mission, in 2016.
“This is probably the foremost mental and physical challenge we have as astronauts – to be outside in the vacuum of space in a 400-pound [181-kilogram] space suit moving that mass around with very, very expensive equipment,” she said.
“That being said, it’s also one of the most fun things we do, so we’re looking forward to many space walks, many EVAs.
“It’s going to be a great expedition.”
Lt Col Ryzhikov, the mission commander, and Mr Kud-Sverchkov are set to carry out a space walk in the coming weeks, according to reports.
As well as space walks and routine maintenance, ISS residents have over the years undertaken about 3,000 experiments analysing matters such as how the human body functions in space.
In recent years, more commercially funded technical projects have been undertaken, an indication of Nasa’s keenness for private-sector involvement.
Analysts say Nasa is keen to ultimately hand over its portion of the ISS to the private sector so that the billions of dollars a year it spends on the ISS could go to other programmes, notably those involving the Moon.
Dr Rubins, a microbiologist, compared the station to a scaled- down university campus with cutting- edge equipment including DNA sequencers and sophisticated microscopes.
“We’re going to continue some of the work on growing cells – we’re going to be growing heart cells,” she said.
“I’m looking forward to a lot of the microbial experiments. I’m looking forward to looking at the station’s microbiome.
“I’m interested in learning who’s here in terms of the microbial populations – who’s here and who’s changing over time.”
The ISS is not focused only on biological experiments. It also has specialist equipment for research in fields such as physics and materials science.
When he spent eight days on board the station after arriving on a Soyuz rocket in September last year, the UAE’s first astro
naut, Maj Hazza Al Mansouri, undertook a series of experiments.
They included some with a robotic camera, designed to offer insights into how the orientation of spacecraft can be controlled.
After Maj Al Mansouri’s trip, the UAE recorded another milestone in its space programme.
In July, the country’s mission to Mars, led by Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre, began with the launch of the Hope probe from Japan.
It is scheduled to reach the Red Planet early next year.
An experiment due to happen on the ISS in the coming months is the growing of radishes, work Nasa says could optimise methods to cultivate the vegetable in space.
In the years to come, Nasa will open up the ISS to visits by tourists – with transport there and back on commercial craft costing tens of millions of dollars – and, in January, it gave approval for a private space company, Axiom, to attach a commercial module to the ISS.
Axiom, which is run by a former Nasa ISS programme manager, ultimately hopes to attach several modules to the ISS, the first of which could be launched in 2024 and allow for new research areas and living space.
The company said work on the ISS could be moved to the commercial modules when decommissioning eventually happens.
Once it is retired, the ISS will be burnt up in the atmosphere over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean, like Russia’s Mir space statio.
The ISS’s retirement is, however, not imminent: it is scheduled to remain in operation until at least 2024 and much of its hardware is certified for use until several years after that.
Speaking at the recent press conference, Lt Col Ryzhikov acknowledged there is a leak in the ISS that needs fixing, but said the overall structure was sound.
Boeing, too, said earlier this year that the ISS was in good shape.
“It has very reliable construction,” said the Russian cosmonaut, who is on his second ISS mission.
“It has various small leaks every day. Now, it’s a little bit more than standard.
“We’re working to find it and replace it. So, don’t worry.”