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In 1984, when President Reagan ordered NASA to build a permanently occupied space station, no one could have predicted the crucial role it would play in space exploration. almost four decades later.
The construction of the International Space Station (ISS) lasted 12 years with the support of 16 countries. It has been populated continuously since November 2000. A colossal feat, regardless of the measure taken: the station weighs a million pounds and is the most expensive object ever built. And it should be.
A true jewel of human performance, the ISS has given the United States and its partners an operational outpost in the most austere environment ever known.
Over the course of his life, more than 2400 experiments were conducted by more than 230 visitors from 18 countries. The station's crew recorded more than 1,300 hours of EVA activity during more than 217 sorties in space. Throughout their lives, teens have experienced a constant technological revolution, in part due exclusively to access to space and research.
But this marvel of innovation has not always had the support it deserves.
Since the culmination of the Apollo program, NASA has been criticized for being too focused on maintaining the Space Shuttle at the expense of deep space exploration. It is therefore not surprising that political support and funding have atrophied. In fact, in 1993, the channel got only one vote on the cancellation in the House of Representatives.
And yet, while few viewers were watching since the shutdown of the shuttle in 2011, a reinvigorated new agency is emerging with a vision that should captivate even the cynics. Under Space Policy Directive 1 (SPD-1), NASA and the ISS National Laboratory are accelerating the country's development towards the commercial space. With an estimated space economy of $ 1 trillion, the ISS can play a key role in shaping the sector.
On board the ISS, a series of basic and applied research programs are underway with the participation of companies such as Boeing, Anheuser-Busch, Sanofi, Lambda Vision, Space Tango, Airbus and Teledyne Brown Engineering. The ISS is in fact the first space R & D laboratory, and companies are using microgravity on the edge of the human frontier 250 miles away to solve problems on Earth.
Beyond the major policy change announced in June to allow stronger business partnerships on board ISS, other milestones are underway. Last month, NASA and Boeing gathered 80% of the huge core needed to launch the space launch system and Orion for their first mission on the Moon: Artemis 1.
Notably, the "new" NASA fee to facilitate and encourage the commercial sector is not new. After all, NASA has fostered some of the greatest technological developments in the history of mankind. And later this year, NASA's commercial transport crew will be launched from Cape Canaveral to replenish the ISS.
But no one should take for granted the daunting task of keeping this course in orbit. Although shielded from the magnetic shield of our planet, the SSI suffered the same fate as an aircraft carrier during the Battle of Midway during the Second World War. Shuttle veteran Alvin Drew told the American Chamber of Commerce a year ago about his experience in EVA with extremely sharp outer ISS surfaces due to the sandblasting effect caused by the ## EQU1 ## Environment in low Earth orbit.
Maintaining the operational status of the station alone is a feat. Over the decades, NASA and Boeing, as a prime contractor, have extended and optimized the platform as a test bench to further our understanding of the effect of microgravity on metabolic systems. Humans are fragile after all. But the SPD-1 boldly traces human explorations on the Moon, Mars and beyond.
With the ISS program as a starting point, NASA's recently announced Lunar Bridge program will serve as a platform to prepare and propel humans to Mars. To paraphrase director James Bridenstine, Gateway will be the permanent moon control module.
And in 2024, Gateway will facilitate the goal of Artemis 1's mission to land astronauts near the South Lunar Pole. But we can not get there from here, not without the ISS. The lion's share of research aboard the stations aims to solve the long-term challenges to human survival in distant spaces. The ISS is the captive vessel from which astronauts will hone their space flight skills to venture beyond the horizon.
In this new era of exploration, the ISS allows you to ask the right questions and get answers. It could be said that until now, we were accustomed to identifying the inherent limitations to the scope of humanity in space. Recently, however, we have begun to ask a more nuanced and intriguing question: what are the unique characteristics of the field beyond the Earth that we can use to our advantage?
Although the future of deep space exploration is not better known today than in 1984, all that is certain, is that the ISS will serve as a launching pad for human movement.
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