Getting our astronauts into and out of space

On 4/3/2014 2:49 AM, wrote:

Well, I guess that would be no threat. We could blow it out of the sky if
necessary. I mean if they were so stupid as to try and weaponize it. Hopefully
all this crap blows over.


Agree with what's already be written about "blowing it out of the sky".
Not a good idea, really not....

Neither is a "controlled re-entry" option a good one. We have had little
experience (none) in bringing such a large object down in one piece as
the ISS. Our (US) previous experience was Skylab and there were fairly
significant risks that even under "controlled" re-entry parts of the
station would come down intact to reach land. (Lead-lined film vault for
starters). The debris field for the ISS will be enormous. It certainly
will not come down as a single fragment. Aerodynamic forces on the
structural elements that are not streamlined will also cause fragments
to follow non-ballistic pathways that I am not convinced are 100%
determinable.

Besides, why go to all the trouble of destroying hardware that was very
expensive to get up there in the first place? I'm still not convinced
that the proper end-of-life procedure for the ISS is not to put it
unoccupied into L4 or L5 for salvage later.

If countries INSIST on doing it the 'hard way', how easy would it be to
partially disassemble in situ before a de-orbit?

You know the more I think about this the more I am convinced its far
easier and safer to just 'keep it there' via occasional rocket boost or
send it to L4/L5.

Dave