2y ago

NASA Requests Funding for $1 Billion 'Space Tug' to Deorbit the ISS

7 comments

I would love to see the cost/feasibility of boosting to a stable/graveyard orbit. The ISS is massive and not built for that kind of maneuver, but it would be great to be able to preserve it for the future.
- Does seem like a massive waste to just get rid of it. Feel like it could be repurposed for other use
  Granted, its international status probably makes any decisions about utilizing it for something else difficult
Wouldn't it be awesome if a bunch of rastas started squatting the station while listening to AI generated dub music, like in Neuromancer?
I say give it to them, billionaires today have no class, just take it and give it to our fellow nerds. Problem solved! Elon was going gamble it away anyway.
Pay a billion to burn it up?
It'd cost a lot less to put it in a higher orbit for a thousand years where it could be a museum for space travellers.
- You can’t do that because it will physically fall apart.
  Don't know where you ever got that idea. It raises and lowers itself all of the time these days to avoid debris.
  It could easily be raised to 2-5000 miles by adding energy from a similar small engine (with a decent-sized fuel tank) over a few months/years.
  'Wear and tear' from what? Micrometeorites? The orbits of any 'small fragments' (of what?) would decay very slowly and instantly burn-up many centuries later.

7 comments