> If you read the article itself you'll find that those names were invented as merely labels for the inconsistencies in how Universe behaved.

That's just dismissively reductive. Those "mere" inconsistencies were like half a dozen separate observations that differed from expected values by a pretty exact amount, noted by many people, across many decades. This wasn't some flippant, casual invention but the product of rigorous observation and calculation, challenged at every step by multiple other parties with alternate theories that, themselves, do not explain all of the aforementioned observations.

By your complaints, I offer you just don't understand the data.

Let's not tear down the publicly funded station until there's an existing alternative that we like.

Given that we just bailed out Silicon valley bank for around $100B, that should be their free handout for the next decade, and let's build it with public money, as a public resource.

MRO entered Mars orbit on April 6th 2006 and used primarily aerobraking until September 11th to shape it's orbit around Mars. Ain't nobody got that kind of time. In KSP, you just send up a bit more fuel.

https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/mars-reconnaissance-orbiter/in-depth/

Technically, everyone is probably moving pretty fast. XD

The Lunar Gateway isn't a replacement for the ISS, for one it won't be continuously inhabited.

Speculating here but if they are hanging by ropes and they move too fast they might end up swinging, which will break the effect.

It still seems to me that even though the useful life of the ISS is limited, and its value as a building site for a new station has diminished, that 420 tons of pretty much <anything> in LEO is a useful resource. Reconfiguring the thing for less cross-section then firing up something like a dragon with nothing but fuel, seems like a fairly small investment even if you have no specific plans for it in the future.

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I really hope we decide to keep it going instead of killing it off. At least until some other system takes her place. Like two starships docked together.

Why bring the whole thing down like that? I always assumed the plan would be to dismantle it and send each piece down to burn up in the atmosphere? Would that not happen?

There is, but not in the way people would normally think. Usually, there’s two of each module made in case something happens. Take all of the spares, make an ISS on the ground.

Edit: I need to do some research if spares were made for the main modules. Kinda want to see how much of this would be possible for a full list. At the least, there’s a list of some spares that might be used.

How come? Shouldn’t it just be like a cargo dragon that has its Draco’s pointing retrograde and then do a burn?

Yeah, it really doesn't take a lot. TBH it does seem a little oversimple to me, just because the drag on the station isn't a constant- bringing it down is easy, bringing it down exactly where and when you want it to is not so simple, being able to brute force that could be very useful.

Def should be called the drunk uncle maneuver.

For quite a while it was assumed that using the old ISS as the building site for a new one was the best way to do it- without the shuttle, assembling was going to be harder. But the chinese station pretty much shows that time's past, especially considering that you don't necessarily want the new station in the same orbit

If you want to experience it, you can play a VR simulation of a spacewalk outside the ISS. You really want to have handholds nearby.

It's free on Q2, or at least it was when I got it.

Because if you went fast in real life you could hurt yourself.

The movie Gravity is pretty good for showing how fast someone should probably move.

Remember if you are outside the shit untethered you would really really really want to make sure you could grab a hold of the next thing.

Going fast you might just bounce off something.

Inside you don't want to collide with another person or whatever.

Dark Energy = Epicycle invented to explain the hypothesis of an expanding universe.

Medium sized boosters: smash it into the moon.

Isn't the next one going to be a moon orbiting station or something?

> popsci "journalists" like to make sound as sensationalized as possible.

Of course they do. We live in a clickbaity world, because they need to attract eyeballs to earn ad revenue. That's why you see headlines about asteroids all the time. But when you read the article, you find they will miss Earth by millions of miles (usually) and are not a danger. But you already clicked the story, and ad counter went up.

That would take so much more energery

There's no real way to do it. Nothing exists that can bring the segments down intact so the only option is to try and boost it into a parking orbit somewhere. At that point it's basically just more abandoned crap in space.

I get you, but it's just not practical in any way even taking money out of the equation.

Boosters yes unless my calcs are off, usually more transfer stages.

Makes me think of how wasteful I am in KSP