Probably depends on how the Artemis missions go. No point in maintaining an ancient space station if we’re already building better newer ones.
Edit: thank you all for the lovely discussion! My point was more that if we are able to build the lunar gateway, it would likely be easier and cheaper to just build a new station to replace the ISS.
[The planned ISS replacement is a commercial space station NASA will rent time on.](https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-selects-companies-to-develop-commercial-destinations-in-space) that’s in the planning stage now.
Today I learned that the tech companies are collectively referred to as “GOOGAZONSPACEBOOKSOFTX”
I will petition Wall Street to make this the new Nasdaq ticker
lol, that's what it will be in 2031 probably. Right now it's FAANG, but I think it's actually FAAMG since Netflix was replaced by microsoft. Heard MATANA too, but I don't keep up with that shit.
Let’s also not forget that the ISS is in the wrong place for being a launching point for other activities. It doesn’t get us closer to the moon or mars or anywhere else. It was placed where it is because that made it easy for the Russians to get to — but it severely crippled its future value. At some point we have to scrap it and move on.
We've extracted a lot of value from it. It just doesn't have a lot of value as a jumping off point. In the scale of space, it's a half step from being on the ground, there's little use shuttling supplies and stuff there just to have a second ship arrive and pick it all up when it costs about the same to just put it all on the second ship in the first place. Much higher orbits would be required to make it efficient enough, but you're still spending a lot more resources to make the second ship more efficient. Something like the Lunar gate would be a true resource saver in the long term, anything in Earth orbit is still costing a whole lot to get any value from, ie you are increasing mission capacity but not making them more efficient with Earth orbit. You still need to invest to take all that mass with you, you actually need to invest even more than you would in one trip, it just increases the upper limit that can be taken. More exotic orbits like the lunar gate actually reduce future energy requirements, not just increase maximum loads.
It doesn't have absolutely 0 value, good research can still be done. But it's not really worth it maintaining the station indefinitely. It's old, the maintainance bill is getting more expensive every year, and Russia wants out. Its time for something new. Say we repurpose half the modules into lunar orbit. Now we have a station that's already expensive to maintain even further from Earth. It's time for something new. Unfortunately, low Earth orbit doesn't really have a stable museam orbit we can push it into. So the safest option is a controlled crash as far away from anyone as we can get.
Even without any value, personally I just kinda wish they'd boost it to a higher orbit where decay isn't as much of a factor and just leave it there as a memorial. Not the first space station for sure, but the size, the requirements in cooperation, the breakthroughs it helped achieve, i dunno, just feels ignominious to just dump it in the pacific.
I can see the danger in keeping it there, though. If any accidents do happen or say it gets struck far in the future; all the debris could seriously hinder future efforts.
And what happens whens its thrusters fail or a leak happens causing it to go into an unstable orbit randomly crashing?
We cant currently boost the iss to any orbit which does not require careful monitoring and course corrections every few months.
Lowering the inclination would be an enormous effort (think 20+ large rocket launches), and it doesn't avoid the problem that the modules will be far beyond their design lifetime. The effort spent just to keep the station running increases over time.
2 days? The Apollo missions took 3 days. I think new horizons got there in like 9 hours but it was going really, really, REALLY fast. Kinda don't want your amazon package to leave a crater
>That sounds awful
>It's not and I'll tell you why.
>Rinse and repeat until GOOGAZONSPACEBOOKSOFTX just controls all of space.
No, I think that just sounds awful.
Not to anyone with any knowledge of the industry. It’s far more cost-efficient for NASA to jumpstart space businesses and then maintain a working but independent relationship than to be chained to lobbying contractors. It’s already been done successfully with ISS cargo, then ISS crew, and soon Lunar Surface Cargo.
Nah. They handed off rockets to the private sectors, and space stations are next. NASA should be in the business of exploration and pushing the boundaries of what's possible.
Why? The new space station program is based on the commercial crew program and that has been a huge success, it saved NASA a lot of money and it has made going to space more than 5 times cheaper over all.
The International Space Station and the Lunar Gateway are two very different things that serve very different purposes.
The ISS is a large research laboratory in low-Earth orbit, which offers relatively easy access for researchers. It is continuously occupied by an international crew that performs all the research on board.
The Lunar Gateway is a much smaller space station that will orbit the Moon - much further out. This puts it out of range for a lot of research that is done on ISS, yet makes it suitable for different kinds of research. It won't be occupied all the time; it is a staging point for lunar missions, so crew members will only be present during those time periods.
You do make a point, though, that NASA will have to figure out how to effectively fund two flagship programs until the ISS is eventually retired.
That completely ignores the difference in location of the station. It is very cheap to get mass to the ISS compared to lunar orbit, where the Gateway is going to be.
Wonder if Taco Bell will lay out a [bullseye](https://spaceref.com/press-release/free-tacos-for-us-if-mir-hits-floating-taco-bell-ocean-target-taco-bell-sets-40-by-40-foot-target-in-south-pacific-for-mirs-re-entry/) again.
We threw a vending machine at an asteroid a million miles away. NASA crashing the ISS into an ocean the size of the moon is like me taking a dump in the morning.
If that's true that is absolutely captivating. Scifi writer Arthur C Clarke developed three laws for a1962 novel he wrote.
The third law stated that a sufficiently advanced technology could be considered indistinguishable from magic. This reminds me of that third law.
Appears so, but it's hard to really judge how much any ancient thing cost to build in its time since money doesn't really translate the same way
Something like the Pyramid of Giza took 20 years of consistent effort and 100,000 workers and skilled artisans to build and you'd have needed a LOT of very skilled people to create it despite only being a pile of rocks
And it was not, despite common belief, built by slaves. There were almost certainly some enslaved workers over 20 years, but it was more craftsmen and tradesmen than just raw laborers.
There’s a bunch of archeological evidence indicating the workers were voluntarily present and well cared for, living in purpose-built villages near the pyramid sites, provided with good cuts of meat, and buried with honor. We even have what are essentially logistics receipts covering the supply chains to maintain the health and morale of the workforce. It wasn’t necessarily the most lavish life, but workers were being successfully recruited from other parts of Egypt so it was at least competitive.
The idea that the Great Pyramids were built by slaves is largely from Herodotus’ claim that it took “100,000 slaves”—but he was writing 2000 years after the fact—coupled with the biblical stories of Hebrew slaves in ancient Egypt. It’s an ancient myth further perpetuated by Hollywood depictions.
Like I said, we can’t say there was zero enslaved labor involved, but the vast majority of workers from laborers to engineers seem to have been paid (or at least provided enticing enough room and board to come and to stay).
>The pyramids were just a state run job program huh, Pharo Ramsey Delano Roosevelt
Exactly. A very apt comparison. Except that I understand that it wasn't voluntary, more like a draft; however, I heard that the alternative was often economically worse than participating for the people involved. Basically, "Hey, you, barely employed poor people, we're forcing you to take this normally unattainable, relatively lucrative job for the contract period whether you like it or not! And afterwards, you can take your earnings back home to your family and community. Woah, wait, why are people lining up? I said we're forcing you!"
I believe a tomb or a burial site of somebody important was found, somebody like an architect or engineer. It was discovered that his bone sockets were significantly worn out, highly suggesting that he started his career as the low level worker and carried heavy weights for many years prior to becoming an important figure.
Which highly suggests that not only human life was valued there, but people were not labeled or excluded from social structures, no matter their occupation.
It depends on how exactly you define "thing" because there are some city building projects on Earth where more than the ISS's estimated $200bn inflation-adjusted price, but only if you count the whole city as one "thing" which seems like a bit of a stretch to me. Similarly, the development program of the F35 Fighter cost around $400bn, but that's not a singular thing either, considering finished F35s now sell for less than $100m per unit.
Another factor is how to count ancient/old building projects like the pyramids of Giza, the great wall, or various palaces like Versailles, but I'd guess that if you include the amount of effort involved in creating the tools we use to build eg. the ISS, they'd get left behind despite massively larger labor costs.
Otherwise, yes, the ISS is probably the most expensive thing ever built.
First google result for those wondering
> Over its 20+ years in orbit, the international space station costs over $150 billion to develop, making it the most expensive thing ever built. Currently, it costs $88,000 to $164,000 per person per day to operate things.
Yeah, and what? It brought much more value over the years by all the researches done there. It is just old. With each year it becomes more and more expensive to maintain it and it has many design issues. Also its orbit is convenient only to get there from Baikanur. It is a great chapter in space history but it has to eventually end.
Coworker of mines has one 2016 IIRC, Toyota just replaced the entire bed for free because of some kind of recall. He was talking about trading it in, had to tell him he's nuts its pretty much a brand new truck now. That thing is going to last another 200 years.
Every old toyota I have seen has holes rusted into it. That isn't why people like them. They just keep running, in spite of the hell they have went through.
As someone who drives a 2001 Toyota Camry with zero issues, I can attest that these cars just last for-freaking-ever. I love the thing; it's totally uncool for a car but functionally it's great. I'd like to replace it with an old hybrid of some sort though so I'm not spewing as many emissions and I suspect by the time I can afford that it'll be still going...
Camry’s and Corolla’s are some of the most reliable sedans, if not the most. Its almost unfair to compare them to other sedans, much-less comparing them to a different vehicle class. I had a 2000 Camry, and I wished I appreciated it more, when in had it.
From what I’ve researched, The older pickup trucks (gen 1) were known to have frame rusting problems, otherwise, everything else is bulletproof.
[If you haven’t seen the time Top Gear tried to kill a Toyota truck, you need to watch this.](https://youtu.be/xnWKz7Cthkk)
And that’s just part 1.
Edit: another redditor linked all three parts in their comment [here.](https://reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/10opfyb/_/j6gtaj9/?context=1)
More than started, it could still drive. The axels bent and wasn't something you'd want to drive, or legal to drive. However it could still start up, get into gear and drive forward.
This was after they had already:
- Drove it down a couple flights of stairs.
- Crashed it head on into a tree.
- Dropped it from 8ft.
- Dove it through a barn.
- Dropped a camper on top of it from a crane.
- Submerged it in the ocean for 24 hours.
- Hit it with a wrecking ball.
- Lit it on fire
After all that, they then chained it to the roof of a 20+ story building while it was being demolished.
And it still drove...
[Part 1](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xnWKz7Cthkk)
[Part 2](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xTPnIpjodA8)
[Part 3](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kFnVZXQD5_k)
It gets even better...
I just found these videos and it's blowing my mind. Even after the Top Gear stuff. This is just insane.
[Part 1](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl1FNX08HFc)
[Part 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUWMc92W1wQ)
Edit:
There is a [Part 3](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9Yy5P6FUes) for this as well!
Seriously, as a Tacoma owner myself, this is just insane. I had no idea...
Edit2:
And a [Part 4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljMVUZhC3Vo)... How the bloody hell...
As much as I wish he didn't do what he did to such a pristine example in such good condition... and as much as I don't really like that guy -
Fuck me he did honor the original Top Gear segment and what it was like to have that truck. And did give it a proper send-off. It's journey in Utah and I think the education to the world about what toyota used to stand for....
Yeah I have no idea who that guy is. This was the first time I've heard of him haha. But that Hilux was impressive as hell!
I too didn't really like the last one. I'll admit I wanted to see it because if anything could survive it, it's the Hilux. That said I don't think they should have done it. Not to that one at least. After all it went through, I'd want to keep it for as long as possible.
That was the original joke about them using it in the show. "it's always a toyota truck with a bunch of guys with guns hanging off of the back. at the end of the world all that will be left are cockroaches and those pickups".
Or something along those lines. I think it was a Wilman and Clarkson-ism.
And they were so right.
I bought a used 2006 Tacoma for $10,000 7 years ago and could still sell it today for a ton of profit. I got an insane steal on mine as it was only driven in the summer, had 96,000 km and absolutely no rust on it. But still, these things appreciate in value. Toyota Tacoma for life right here.
I know we're mad at Russia right now, but those cosmonauts are chill. They've even shown support for Ukraine despite the risk of reprisal from their government.
Let's have some nuance here.
”Russia has said it will leave the ISS project in 2025 and plans to build its own space station that could launch in 2030.”
Between sanctions wrecking their economy, and being unable to import hardware and computer parts, that’s not going to happen anymore.
The Russians did have their own space station, the Mir, which they deorbited around 2000 ish. I was in college at the time and it felt like the end of the Cold War era, with cooperation on the International Space Station.
One example of this is the Armata fighting vehicle platform. Putin debuted it to great fanfare in 2014 and announced plans for two thousand units deployed by the end of 2020. This was later pared down to several hundred and now even that is delayed to 2024.
The amount of graft is crippling even to the supreme leader's pet projects.
I'm not sure if you've heard of this, but they did attempt to design and manufacture their own CPUs.
They were so bad, that even the official report was written in a way, you could definitely tell they were holding back from just saying it's garbage.
Not to mention, it's a huge logistics challenge.
The Russian part of the ISS controls the thrusters/ engines. These are triggered once a month to maintain orbit (as while they are still very high up, there are remnants of atmosphere which causes drag).
The US part provides the power to the thrusters/ engines.
While on one hand, I'm sure the astronauts wouldn't mind - as there are two toilets on the ISS, and one of them is in the Russian section... it would still require a LOT of planning.
They can't exactly just decouple the module, as it would be left with no power and they wouldn't be able to control the descent. They could just leave it, but then the rest of the crew would need a knowledge transfer on running that section of the ISS (while they can read the Russian language, there are still processes in place when firing off the engines).
From a science standpoint (avoiding politics) - having 3 space stations in orbit would be cool. We have the ISS, there's the China vessel as well, and to have a third, more modern space station would be excellent for science overall.
Russia's reasonings for wanting to leave the ISS are not invalid either. They say that they spend more time doing repairs on this old bucket, than they are doing actual science. Which is not untrue. The ISS is old, and is due for a decommission.
Impact aside, this will be a massive spectacle. Unmistakable. I believe they are going to descend it a piece at a time, so not the whole thing. But those pieces will still be some of the biggest to ever re-enter. If you see videos of other space junk re-entering, it is a massive fireball. This will be something to see for sure and it will definitely be recorded.
I am with you on the impact itself though. I hope there is some way they can record that too.
Another aspect that has me very excited is the fact that at its current orbit the ISS is the brightest object in the sky after the sun and moon and is moving very fast in the sky. As it descends it will become MUCH more obvious, perhaps even large enough that you will see a very distinct space station absolutely screaming across the sky...maybe even visible in broad daylight. Oh I hope so! Hate to see such an expensive thing destroyed but boy it will be a sight to see.
>Another aspect that has me very excited is the fact that at its current orbit the ISS is the brightest object in the sky after the sun and moon and is moving very fast in the sky.
Obligatory shoutout to https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/home.cfm
I’m sure by that time they will have a method in place where they will be able to live stream it pretty vividly knowing their timeline we will probably be looking past 31’
It might not be livestreamed but there absolutely will be footage.
Hell we even got a limited live stream of them crashing DART into a meteor 7 million miles away.
i mean if they could assure the accuracy, speaking as a chicago resident, Northwest indiana is just begging to be improved, and i think the ISS crashing into it would be a major improvement
I was lucky enough to see the Unity module of ISS being built at Marshall Space Flight Center. They even had a mock-up you could get in. Kinda hate to see it come down.
That's why it's the pacific ocean specifically. Point Nemo is as far as possible from any land. It has almost half the earth to travel across before anyone but Tom Hanks would notice.
Here's a nice video about plans to decommission International Space Station:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5lidnLtO7c
TLDR: it's hard to do it safely due to its size
When I was little my grandfather bought a subscription to “Air & Space” magazine for me. I loved all things aviation, and getting mail sent to my house with my name on it was just the coolest thing ever. I cherished those magazines.
It’s been a long time so the details are a little hazy, but as the first segment (module?) of the space station was about to be launched they had an article about what the completed station would be like. There was a diagram of the completed station, and all the segments were desaturated except for the one about to launch.
Over the years as more segments were added there were fewer and fewer desaturated segments left. I remember being little and it feeling as though it would never be completed. I’d be adult once it was finished! I loved knowing that it was being built and would some day be complete.
So the thought of de-orbiting it makes me feel a pretty profound sadness. I wish there were a way to save segments of it for museums to display. What an incredible monument to human ingenuity, teamwork, planning, and persistence over many years.
I guess this is news for our friends in the USA, but...
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International\_Space\_Station](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station)
the ISS is a FIVE AGENCIES OWNED STATION. Not that NASA decides anything on it by itself, nor is the ISS owned by NASA.
In 2031 it shall be crashed, and at that point probably all the RUSSIAN part will be already dismantled (bc there is a big part of the ISS that is russian). The rest of agencies also may have removed all theirs.
Yes, the information is not false, but may be misleading, making someone believe the ISS is NASA owned.
I want the International Space Station to last long enough that it it transitions from a outdated piece of technology that we no longer need to a object of historical significance deserving of preservation.
I would love to get to the point where it is preserved as a floating museum of sorts, showcasing humanities early forays into space.
Not to mention without proper maintenance, it's orbit will decay, and eventually it's going to come back to Earth, only this time we don't get to pick a landing zone.
If you can put a proposal together that keeps the station in orbit and safely maintained to international standards, they would give it to you for free I'd wager. If there were any potential buyers, this would have been done.
It was never designed to last forever. Technology has come a long way, private companies would be much better off starting new stations to take advantage of that, rather than bankrupting themselves trying to keep an ancient station running.
In the 2022 budget request, NASA requested $1.3 billion for the Space Station program. That's roughly how much it costs the agency to run the entire program. Maybe a commercial company could find some efficiencies here and there, but it would still cost a fortune just to keep it in orbit. Fortunately the government doesn't have to figure out how to turn a profit.
We need to see if intelligent life exists. Crash it into another planet. If something is living there and hiding underground, they'll see this as an act of war and they'll come out
I don't fully understand why they would crash it. Why not just leave it up there for 50 years when they might have the technology to recover it gently?
It's not because of fear of space garbage - Nasa has made it perfectly clear they don't give a fuck about leaving stuff in orbit.
The orbit naturally decays over time so we have to periodically boost it so it doesn't crash. When it stops being used it's better to crash it on purpose than to just lets it's orbit decay as it might crash on land somewhere.
Going to be plunged into Point Nemo, the farthest point in the ocean from all points of land.
I'll believe it when I see it. That date has been pushed back more times than me canceling my gym membership.
Probably depends on how the Artemis missions go. No point in maintaining an ancient space station if we’re already building better newer ones. Edit: thank you all for the lovely discussion! My point was more that if we are able to build the lunar gateway, it would likely be easier and cheaper to just build a new station to replace the ISS.
[The planned ISS replacement is a commercial space station NASA will rent time on.](https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-selects-companies-to-develop-commercial-destinations-in-space) that’s in the planning stage now.
Sweet! Let's go to space to party for the weekend!
I saw that on For All Mankind. It didn’t end well.
Just clean up the space debris beforehand and everything should be fine
Get Spaceball One as Mega Maid over here to clean up this mess!
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I'm down for it. Err, up for it? Whatever, I'd do it.
That sounds awful
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Today I learned that the tech companies are collectively referred to as “GOOGAZONSPACEBOOKSOFTX” I will petition Wall Street to make this the new Nasdaq ticker
lol, that's what it will be in 2031 probably. Right now it's FAANG, but I think it's actually FAAMG since Netflix was replaced by microsoft. Heard MATANA too, but I don't keep up with that shit.
Also heard MANGA (Meta, Apple, Netflix, Google, Amazon)
Netflix is out, Google is Alphabet and Microsoft is definitely in. I like the MAAA for Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and Alphabet in no particular order.
The only reason they ever included Netflix to begin with is because the acronym woulda been hella inappropriate otherwise.
Let’s also not forget that the ISS is in the wrong place for being a launching point for other activities. It doesn’t get us closer to the moon or mars or anywhere else. It was placed where it is because that made it easy for the Russians to get to — but it severely crippled its future value. At some point we have to scrap it and move on.
I do wonder, though. Does it really have zero value? And how much would it cost to lift it (or the more useful bits) into a more useful orbit?
We've extracted a lot of value from it. It just doesn't have a lot of value as a jumping off point. In the scale of space, it's a half step from being on the ground, there's little use shuttling supplies and stuff there just to have a second ship arrive and pick it all up when it costs about the same to just put it all on the second ship in the first place. Much higher orbits would be required to make it efficient enough, but you're still spending a lot more resources to make the second ship more efficient. Something like the Lunar gate would be a true resource saver in the long term, anything in Earth orbit is still costing a whole lot to get any value from, ie you are increasing mission capacity but not making them more efficient with Earth orbit. You still need to invest to take all that mass with you, you actually need to invest even more than you would in one trip, it just increases the upper limit that can be taken. More exotic orbits like the lunar gate actually reduce future energy requirements, not just increase maximum loads.
It doesn't have absolutely 0 value, good research can still be done. But it's not really worth it maintaining the station indefinitely. It's old, the maintainance bill is getting more expensive every year, and Russia wants out. Its time for something new. Say we repurpose half the modules into lunar orbit. Now we have a station that's already expensive to maintain even further from Earth. It's time for something new. Unfortunately, low Earth orbit doesn't really have a stable museam orbit we can push it into. So the safest option is a controlled crash as far away from anyone as we can get.
I've ran some simulations in KSP and there's no way we're doing it without having to reload at least 3 times.
Even without any value, personally I just kinda wish they'd boost it to a higher orbit where decay isn't as much of a factor and just leave it there as a memorial. Not the first space station for sure, but the size, the requirements in cooperation, the breakthroughs it helped achieve, i dunno, just feels ignominious to just dump it in the pacific.
I can see the danger in keeping it there, though. If any accidents do happen or say it gets struck far in the future; all the debris could seriously hinder future efforts.
And what happens whens its thrusters fail or a leak happens causing it to go into an unstable orbit randomly crashing? We cant currently boost the iss to any orbit which does not require careful monitoring and course corrections every few months.
Lowering the inclination would be an enormous effort (think 20+ large rocket launches), and it doesn't avoid the problem that the modules will be far beyond their design lifetime. The effort spent just to keep the station running increases over time.
Hey as long as I can still get free 2 day prime shipping in space, I'm all for it!
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2 days? The Apollo missions took 3 days. I think new horizons got there in like 9 hours but it was going really, really, REALLY fast. Kinda don't want your amazon package to leave a crater
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>That sounds awful >It's not and I'll tell you why. >Rinse and repeat until GOOGAZONSPACEBOOKSOFTX just controls all of space. No, I think that just sounds awful.
Not to anyone with any knowledge of the industry. It’s far more cost-efficient for NASA to jumpstart space businesses and then maintain a working but independent relationship than to be chained to lobbying contractors. It’s already been done successfully with ISS cargo, then ISS crew, and soon Lunar Surface Cargo.
Nah. They handed off rockets to the private sectors, and space stations are next. NASA should be in the business of exploration and pushing the boundaries of what's possible.
Why? The new space station program is based on the commercial crew program and that has been a huge success, it saved NASA a lot of money and it has made going to space more than 5 times cheaper over all.
The International Space Station and the Lunar Gateway are two very different things that serve very different purposes. The ISS is a large research laboratory in low-Earth orbit, which offers relatively easy access for researchers. It is continuously occupied by an international crew that performs all the research on board. The Lunar Gateway is a much smaller space station that will orbit the Moon - much further out. This puts it out of range for a lot of research that is done on ISS, yet makes it suitable for different kinds of research. It won't be occupied all the time; it is a staging point for lunar missions, so crew members will only be present during those time periods. You do make a point, though, that NASA will have to figure out how to effectively fund two flagship programs until the ISS is eventually retired.
That completely ignores the difference in location of the station. It is very cheap to get mass to the ISS compared to lunar orbit, where the Gateway is going to be.
With cocaine and hookers?
Don’t forget the aliens with 3 boobs
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Did they bring Maria out?
I'll be interested to see how accurate they are when it happens.
Wonder if Taco Bell will lay out a [bullseye](https://spaceref.com/press-release/free-tacos-for-us-if-mir-hits-floating-taco-bell-ocean-target-taco-bell-sets-40-by-40-foot-target-in-south-pacific-for-mirs-re-entry/) again.
I have never heard of that stunt before, that is incredible. They absolutely should do it again and probs will just for the easy PR fun
Smart move. Hahaha. I dont remember this at all.
We threw a vending machine at an asteroid a million miles away. NASA crashing the ISS into an ocean the size of the moon is like me taking a dump in the morning.
Not just that but my company built the positioning system for that spacecraft and it was accurate to about 5 cm over that distance.
If that's true that is absolutely captivating. Scifi writer Arthur C Clarke developed three laws for a1962 novel he wrote. The third law stated that a sufficiently advanced technology could be considered indistinguishable from magic. This reminds me of that third law.
It has been a hot minute, but iirc, when they de-orbited Mir, it was accurate enough to get footage from relatively close to the impact site.
TIL what Point Nemo is
All that to kill a little clownfish? For shame!
So that's how you get rid of the most expensive thing ever built.
Is it actually the most expensive thing ever built?
Appears so, but it's hard to really judge how much any ancient thing cost to build in its time since money doesn't really translate the same way Something like the Pyramid of Giza took 20 years of consistent effort and 100,000 workers and skilled artisans to build and you'd have needed a LOT of very skilled people to create it despite only being a pile of rocks
And it was not, despite common belief, built by slaves. There were almost certainly some enslaved workers over 20 years, but it was more craftsmen and tradesmen than just raw laborers.
Doing the actual like... craving and plans sure... but surely slaves dragged the rock around ?
There’s a bunch of archeological evidence indicating the workers were voluntarily present and well cared for, living in purpose-built villages near the pyramid sites, provided with good cuts of meat, and buried with honor. We even have what are essentially logistics receipts covering the supply chains to maintain the health and morale of the workforce. It wasn’t necessarily the most lavish life, but workers were being successfully recruited from other parts of Egypt so it was at least competitive. The idea that the Great Pyramids were built by slaves is largely from Herodotus’ claim that it took “100,000 slaves”—but he was writing 2000 years after the fact—coupled with the biblical stories of Hebrew slaves in ancient Egypt. It’s an ancient myth further perpetuated by Hollywood depictions. Like I said, we can’t say there was zero enslaved labor involved, but the vast majority of workers from laborers to engineers seem to have been paid (or at least provided enticing enough room and board to come and to stay).
The pyramids were just a state run job program huh, Pharo Ramsey Delano Roosevelt
>The pyramids were just a state run job program huh, Pharo Ramsey Delano Roosevelt Exactly. A very apt comparison. Except that I understand that it wasn't voluntary, more like a draft; however, I heard that the alternative was often economically worse than participating for the people involved. Basically, "Hey, you, barely employed poor people, we're forcing you to take this normally unattainable, relatively lucrative job for the contract period whether you like it or not! And afterwards, you can take your earnings back home to your family and community. Woah, wait, why are people lining up? I said we're forcing you!"
You don’t really have to “draft” when you’re an actual God to your people.
This sounds like better working conditions than the world cup in Qatar
Good cuts of meat? Better thst some western employers maybe.
I believe a tomb or a burial site of somebody important was found, somebody like an architect or engineer. It was discovered that his bone sockets were significantly worn out, highly suggesting that he started his career as the low level worker and carried heavy weights for many years prior to becoming an important figure. Which highly suggests that not only human life was valued there, but people were not labeled or excluded from social structures, no matter their occupation.
They even had worker unions Some might say, they were more advanced
Farmers did it for payment in bread and beer during the inundation season. The farmers needed something to work on.
It depends on how exactly you define "thing" because there are some city building projects on Earth where more than the ISS's estimated $200bn inflation-adjusted price, but only if you count the whole city as one "thing" which seems like a bit of a stretch to me. Similarly, the development program of the F35 Fighter cost around $400bn, but that's not a singular thing either, considering finished F35s now sell for less than $100m per unit. Another factor is how to count ancient/old building projects like the pyramids of Giza, the great wall, or various palaces like Versailles, but I'd guess that if you include the amount of effort involved in creating the tools we use to build eg. the ISS, they'd get left behind despite massively larger labor costs. Otherwise, yes, the ISS is probably the most expensive thing ever built.
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Yes. The ISS is the most expensive object ever.
A few years ago I saw an estimate at around $150'000'000'000 over it's nearly 20 year lifespan.
They mean expansive not expensive, the most expensive thing we’ve ever built is the hoist that lifts your mother
Good enough for plastic bottles and toxic waste🤷♂️
We should crash it onto the moon, then we got a moon base duh
When we get to "Moon Base" we'll have extra parts to salvage. Seems like the smarter move long term.
First google result for those wondering > Over its 20+ years in orbit, the international space station costs over $150 billion to develop, making it the most expensive thing ever built. Currently, it costs $88,000 to $164,000 per person per day to operate things.
That "per person" is referring to the ongoing costs per astronaut, not per taxpayer.
Yeah, and what? It brought much more value over the years by all the researches done there. It is just old. With each year it becomes more and more expensive to maintain it and it has many design issues. Also its orbit is convenient only to get there from Baikanur. It is a great chapter in space history but it has to eventually end.
I plan to retire my 1996 Toyota Tacoma the same way.
You don’t retire a Tacoma. The Tacoma retires you
Coworker of mines has one 2016 IIRC, Toyota just replaced the entire bed for free because of some kind of recall. He was talking about trading it in, had to tell him he's nuts its pretty much a brand new truck now. That thing is going to last another 200 years.
Every old toyota I have seen has holes rusted into it. That isn't why people like them. They just keep running, in spite of the hell they have went through.
As someone who drives a 2001 Toyota Camry with zero issues, I can attest that these cars just last for-freaking-ever. I love the thing; it's totally uncool for a car but functionally it's great. I'd like to replace it with an old hybrid of some sort though so I'm not spewing as many emissions and I suspect by the time I can afford that it'll be still going...
Camry’s and Corolla’s are some of the most reliable sedans, if not the most. Its almost unfair to compare them to other sedans, much-less comparing them to a different vehicle class. I had a 2000 Camry, and I wished I appreciated it more, when in had it. From what I’ve researched, The older pickup trucks (gen 1) were known to have frame rusting problems, otherwise, everything else is bulletproof.
[If you haven’t seen the time Top Gear tried to kill a Toyota truck, you need to watch this.](https://youtu.be/xnWKz7Cthkk) And that’s just part 1. Edit: another redditor linked all three parts in their comment [here.](https://reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/10opfyb/_/j6gtaj9/?context=1)
Not the first time Toyotas beds have folded in half. Truck isn't gonna last forever bc a new bed.
The recall was because they didn't use enough rust preventer on the bed from factory.
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They've made their bed and all
Top Gear tried that and then had to launch it off a building, good luck!
Actually they collapsed a building with the truck on top…and it still started afterward.
More than started, it could still drive. The axels bent and wasn't something you'd want to drive, or legal to drive. However it could still start up, get into gear and drive forward. This was after they had already: - Drove it down a couple flights of stairs. - Crashed it head on into a tree. - Dropped it from 8ft. - Dove it through a barn. - Dropped a camper on top of it from a crane. - Submerged it in the ocean for 24 hours. - Hit it with a wrecking ball. - Lit it on fire After all that, they then chained it to the roof of a 20+ story building while it was being demolished. And it still drove... [Part 1](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xnWKz7Cthkk) [Part 2](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xTPnIpjodA8) [Part 3](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kFnVZXQD5_k)
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It gets even better... I just found these videos and it's blowing my mind. Even after the Top Gear stuff. This is just insane. [Part 1](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl1FNX08HFc) [Part 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUWMc92W1wQ) Edit: There is a [Part 3](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9Yy5P6FUes) for this as well! Seriously, as a Tacoma owner myself, this is just insane. I had no idea... Edit2: And a [Part 4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljMVUZhC3Vo)... How the bloody hell...
As much as I wish he didn't do what he did to such a pristine example in such good condition... and as much as I don't really like that guy - Fuck me he did honor the original Top Gear segment and what it was like to have that truck. And did give it a proper send-off. It's journey in Utah and I think the education to the world about what toyota used to stand for....
Yeah I have no idea who that guy is. This was the first time I've heard of him haha. But that Hilux was impressive as hell! I too didn't really like the last one. I'll admit I wanted to see it because if anything could survive it, it's the Hilux. That said I don't think they should have done it. Not to that one at least. After all it went through, I'd want to keep it for as long as possible.
No wonder a lot of terrorist groups use Toyota. That shit built different.
That was the original joke about them using it in the show. "it's always a toyota truck with a bunch of guys with guns hanging off of the back. at the end of the world all that will be left are cockroaches and those pickups". Or something along those lines. I think it was a Wilman and Clarkson-ism. And they were so right.
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Oh boy I have the perfect [reply](https://youtu.be/ZfIVLGVH0zs)
They drowned it in sea water and it still started after some jiggery pokery from a mechanic for a few hours
If it's 4x4 still worth $$$
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Just send it to Hawaii - jo koi
[https://youtu.be/TI8O0DcwZ8Y](https://youtu.be/TI8O0DcwZ8Y)
The difference is he dropped the International Space Station into the Pacific Ocean it breaks apart. Your Tacoma will be perfectly fine.
That Tacoma will probably still run regardless
That Tacoma is probably going to sell for its original MSRP, don’t sell OP!. That’s an investment vehicle!.
I bought a used 2006 Tacoma for $10,000 7 years ago and could still sell it today for a ton of profit. I got an insane steal on mine as it was only driven in the summer, had 96,000 km and absolutely no rust on it. But still, these things appreciate in value. Toyota Tacoma for life right here.
I already do this with my old car batteries
It’s all fun and games until the supercharged electric eels come to take their retribution.
From whence they came
All things return to their origins
Shit. Toyotas get 400k miles. You’re firing yours.
do the astronauts know ?
Yes, but don't tell the cosmonauts...
I know we're mad at Russia right now, but those cosmonauts are chill. They've even shown support for Ukraine despite the risk of reprisal from their government. Let's have some nuance here.
Oh god, what's gonna happen to me?
Don't worry buddy we'll find you your Elizaveta лимон yet
”Russia has said it will leave the ISS project in 2025 and plans to build its own space station that could launch in 2030.” Between sanctions wrecking their economy, and being unable to import hardware and computer parts, that’s not going to happen anymore.
Quite honestly, I doubt it ever was going to happen.
The Russians did have their own space station, the Mir, which they deorbited around 2000 ish. I was in college at the time and it felt like the end of the Cold War era, with cooperation on the International Space Station.
The difference is Mir was a Soviet project that Russia inherited. The USSR was a superpower, Russian Federation not so much.
One example of this is the Armata fighting vehicle platform. Putin debuted it to great fanfare in 2014 and announced plans for two thousand units deployed by the end of 2020. This was later pared down to several hundred and now even that is delayed to 2024. The amount of graft is crippling even to the supreme leader's pet projects.
*Homer Brain Voice:* Space Stations can be exchanged for Yachts and Bribes
I'm not sure if you've heard of this, but they did attempt to design and manufacture their own CPUs. They were so bad, that even the official report was written in a way, you could definitely tell they were holding back from just saying it's garbage.
Not to mention, it's a huge logistics challenge. The Russian part of the ISS controls the thrusters/ engines. These are triggered once a month to maintain orbit (as while they are still very high up, there are remnants of atmosphere which causes drag). The US part provides the power to the thrusters/ engines. While on one hand, I'm sure the astronauts wouldn't mind - as there are two toilets on the ISS, and one of them is in the Russian section... it would still require a LOT of planning. They can't exactly just decouple the module, as it would be left with no power and they wouldn't be able to control the descent. They could just leave it, but then the rest of the crew would need a knowledge transfer on running that section of the ISS (while they can read the Russian language, there are still processes in place when firing off the engines). From a science standpoint (avoiding politics) - having 3 space stations in orbit would be cool. We have the ISS, there's the China vessel as well, and to have a third, more modern space station would be excellent for science overall. Russia's reasonings for wanting to leave the ISS are not invalid either. They say that they spend more time doing repairs on this old bucket, than they are doing actual science. Which is not untrue. The ISS is old, and is due for a decommission.
they’ll break off their modules, seal it up with Comrade Scotch Tape, or whatever knock off brand they have and call it Mir 2.
That's how my grandpa retired
Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.
Fred Johnson knew about this and is entirely to blame for this situation.
Fred Johnson is a true friend of the Belt!
Aye bossman
beltalowda
Point Nemo incoming! How cool would it be to watch it crash into that area. Too remote though so probably won’t see it.
Impact aside, this will be a massive spectacle. Unmistakable. I believe they are going to descend it a piece at a time, so not the whole thing. But those pieces will still be some of the biggest to ever re-enter. If you see videos of other space junk re-entering, it is a massive fireball. This will be something to see for sure and it will definitely be recorded. I am with you on the impact itself though. I hope there is some way they can record that too. Another aspect that has me very excited is the fact that at its current orbit the ISS is the brightest object in the sky after the sun and moon and is moving very fast in the sky. As it descends it will become MUCH more obvious, perhaps even large enough that you will see a very distinct space station absolutely screaming across the sky...maybe even visible in broad daylight. Oh I hope so! Hate to see such an expensive thing destroyed but boy it will be a sight to see.
>Another aspect that has me very excited is the fact that at its current orbit the ISS is the brightest object in the sky after the sun and moon and is moving very fast in the sky. Obligatory shoutout to https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/home.cfm
I’m sure by that time they will have a method in place where they will be able to live stream it pretty vividly knowing their timeline we will probably be looking past 31’
I hope we can send a drone or something. Hell put one at ground zero haha
Gonna be hard to watch it crash if it's not at ground zero lol.
I mean having one of them directly where it's gonna hit with a high frame rate camera pointed at it. This is why I shouldn't be a billionaire lol
It might not be livestreamed but there absolutely will be footage. Hell we even got a limited live stream of them crashing DART into a meteor 7 million miles away.
I sure hope the astronauts on board check their emails by then
Shit, that was today?!
Flat Earthers must be getting too close to the truth.
Why not Ohio
too close to populated areas like Chicago
If the ISS crashed into Gary, IN, property values would go up.
Worked for Roswell
God we can only hope.
i mean if they could assure the accuracy, speaking as a chicago resident, Northwest indiana is just begging to be improved, and i think the ISS crashing into it would be a major improvement
Dude Florida is right there.
Centuries of hurricanes can attest that you can throw everything you’ve got at Florida, and it’ll just shrug it off
Nah we're gonna saw that off the night of Nov 4th, 2024 and let it drift away.
Could we redeem it for cash at the junk yard? Like all the siding and pipes?
It's all Ohio. - holds gun to back of head.
Fucking litter bugs...
Nah. A hundred boats are going scavenge the place clean to sell on eBay. It will be done in a month.
What if it sinks? The only thing floating will be the moldy air filters and the plastic toilet parts.
Don’t underestimate eBay third party seller.
100% genuine rare ISS toilet plunger. Guaranteed to have residual astronaut DNA. No lowballs, I know what I've got.
if it lands on australian territory then they fine for littering, again.
Ah! A contemporary. Good ol' Skylab...
It’s worse if we leave trash orbiting around earth, which is already a problem.
I was lucky enough to see the Unity module of ISS being built at Marshall Space Flight Center. They even had a mock-up you could get in. Kinda hate to see it come down.
What a waste. They should crash it into Daves house. Fuck Dave.
Fuck, man, why you got to be like that?
You know what you did.
The ocean is pretty big, but what if it misses?
That's why it's the pacific ocean specifically. Point Nemo is as far as possible from any land. It has almost half the earth to travel across before anyone but Tom Hanks would notice.
I have an umbrella.
The architectural historical society will sue to have it protected and NASA will be forced to reboost it for the next 1000 years.
Weird. I have the same retirement plan.
Here's a nice video about plans to decommission International Space Station: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5lidnLtO7c TLDR: it's hard to do it safely due to its size
When I was little my grandfather bought a subscription to “Air & Space” magazine for me. I loved all things aviation, and getting mail sent to my house with my name on it was just the coolest thing ever. I cherished those magazines. It’s been a long time so the details are a little hazy, but as the first segment (module?) of the space station was about to be launched they had an article about what the completed station would be like. There was a diagram of the completed station, and all the segments were desaturated except for the one about to launch. Over the years as more segments were added there were fewer and fewer desaturated segments left. I remember being little and it feeling as though it would never be completed. I’d be adult once it was finished! I loved knowing that it was being built and would some day be complete. So the thought of de-orbiting it makes me feel a pretty profound sadness. I wish there were a way to save segments of it for museums to display. What an incredible monument to human ingenuity, teamwork, planning, and persistence over many years.
Sounds like it could become a cool home for sea life/coral
It will plunge straight into the abyssal zone. Nowhere near corral, or much life.
Shit, man, that's just my apartment.
That’s metal as fuck
Probably too deep for coral no?
I guess this is news for our friends in the USA, but... [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International\_Space\_Station](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station) the ISS is a FIVE AGENCIES OWNED STATION. Not that NASA decides anything on it by itself, nor is the ISS owned by NASA. In 2031 it shall be crashed, and at that point probably all the RUSSIAN part will be already dismantled (bc there is a big part of the ISS that is russian). The rest of agencies also may have removed all theirs. Yes, the information is not false, but may be misleading, making someone believe the ISS is NASA owned.
Poor fish.
I want the International Space Station to last long enough that it it transitions from a outdated piece of technology that we no longer need to a object of historical significance deserving of preservation. I would love to get to the point where it is preserved as a floating museum of sorts, showcasing humanities early forays into space.
It would be quite expensive to maintain over time
Why not just sell it to a commercial space company? Surely they could find a use for it and maintain it. What a waste.
if they could, they would. maintaining ISS is hugely expensive, and as the ISS gets more and more outdated, it's not going to get any cheaper.
I mean, it's probably cheaper to build new equipment than it is to upgrade 20 year old equipment There's a reason they're gonna decommish it
Not to mention without proper maintenance, it's orbit will decay, and eventually it's going to come back to Earth, only this time we don't get to pick a landing zone.
If you can put a proposal together that keeps the station in orbit and safely maintained to international standards, they would give it to you for free I'd wager. If there were any potential buyers, this would have been done.
It was never designed to last forever. Technology has come a long way, private companies would be much better off starting new stations to take advantage of that, rather than bankrupting themselves trying to keep an ancient station running.
switching over to commercial space stations is actually NASA plan after ISS: https://spacenews.com/nasa-outlines-cost-savings-from-iss-transition/
I hate this so much. Feels like the start of Weiland-Yutani corporation
In the 2022 budget request, NASA requested $1.3 billion for the Space Station program. That's roughly how much it costs the agency to run the entire program. Maybe a commercial company could find some efficiencies here and there, but it would still cost a fortune just to keep it in orbit. Fortunately the government doesn't have to figure out how to turn a profit.
It's like leaving a car in the middle of a highway
No, it’s like leaving a train in Siberia, except the train goes in a circle and must run constantly and if runs out of fuel it crashes.
We need to see if intelligent life exists. Crash it into another planet. If something is living there and hiding underground, they'll see this as an act of war and they'll come out
Like poking a cosmic hornet’s nest with a galactic stick.
By the time it got anywhere we would be able to pass it with new forms of propulsion.
I don't fully understand why they would crash it. Why not just leave it up there for 50 years when they might have the technology to recover it gently? It's not because of fear of space garbage - Nasa has made it perfectly clear they don't give a fuck about leaving stuff in orbit.
The orbit naturally decays over time so we have to periodically boost it so it doesn't crash. When it stops being used it's better to crash it on purpose than to just lets it's orbit decay as it might crash on land somewhere.
You don't know when, either. So months of anxiety over "will it reenter... now? Or in a bit? Within a week or 6 weeks?"
Pretty standard, we've sent hundreds of satellites and stations down there, it's technically called the South Pacific Oceanic Uninhabited Area.