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The Space Station Is Becoming a Spy Satellite for Wildlife

87 points by Hooke 10y ago

sandworm101 10y ago
Interesting, but why involve the ISS? Putting a receiver/relay into orbit seems the perfect job for a small cube sat, or just a regular com sat. Why all the hassle and delay of human spaceflight? And, being on the ISS, the receiver will be stuck in the ISS orbit. that means not tracking anything at higher latitudes higher than the ISS inclination (ie the far north/south above/below 52*).
- InclinedPlane 10y ago
  Because there are already regular delivery trips to the ISS, and the cost of such experiments is thus substantially subsidized by ISS operations. A cube sat would have a very limited lifespan and cost more than their program budget on its own, besides being too limited to be useful. If their program proves successful they might be able to raise enough money to put hosted payloads on other spacecraft, one of the best being Iridium NEXT. But for now the ISS is their best shot.
- russellalbert 10y ago
  Would be so much better if there were more than one ISS around the globe and use it for this kind of role to stop putting lots of little satellites up.
lexicality 10y ago
It makes me oddly sad that it's "the" space station. The SciFi fan in me thinks we should shove a couple more up there to keep it company.
- nacnud 10y ago
  China has Tiangong-1 [1], which is their first step towards a space station. You can spot it with the naked eye [2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong-1 [2] http://www.n2yo.com/?s=37820 http://www.n2yo.com/?s=37820
- ucaetano 10y ago
  Or you can think the other way around: it is THE space station because countries around the world collaborated to create one large one, instead of each one trying to launch a single small one. There is a lot of synergy from having a single large space station vs. many of small ones.
  - 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
    More of an emacs philosophy than a unix one.
- knz 10y ago
  I agree but there is the small issue of cost. I've read before that the ISS was the most expensive project in global history at > $150B. I used google to confirm the cost and was stuck by 1) the fact that "Is the International Space Station real" was in the autocomplete options, and 2) How bloody expensive the War on Terror was/is ($1.7 Trillion according to Google).
  - InclinedPlane 10y ago
    The ISS's cost was substantially due to the cost of the Shuttle program. Building an equivalent space station today using the rockets and systems we have available now would likely be considerably cheaper, by a factor of 10 or more.
    - jessriedel 10y ago
      Do you have cites to support this? My intuition says that only holds if you compare shuttle-as-it-was with other-rockets-as-hoped.
      - InclinedPlane 10y ago
        It should almost go without saying. The Shuttle was one of the most expensive launch vehicles in history. There are several helpful counterpoints to hand though. Two being the history Russian and Chinese space stations. All of them, including the Russian components of the ISS, have been vastly less expensive per module than the US components of ISS. Even if you factor in building and launching modules by US standards on US rockets it's still vastly less expensive than using the Shuttle. Moreover, we've already seen that it's possible for US companies to deliver spacecraft to the ISS in the commercial cargo program. It would actually be just as easy to deliver components to the station using similar systems for about the same cost as a cargo launch today (around $150 mil at the high end). Over the roughly 2 dozen assembly flights for the Shuttle assembled side of the ISS that works out to an equivalent cost of about $4 billion, plus extra module construction costs. Keeping in mind that such flights have already been used or are being planned to use for adding modules to the ISS (such as BEAM and IDA).
- drzaiusapelord 10y ago
  The entire point of the ISS was to consolidate all the efforts and budgets of various space programs and build one trans-national station. Why would you participate in this and then also build a second one? What benefit would you get? This is like saying its depressing that there's only one internet. Arguably, without the ISS there probably wouldn't be any space stations. Stations were falling out of fashion by the 90s and even before were largely propagandist projects. The ISS was an attempt to turn all this wasted effort into something world usable (not just for the space faring powers of the time) and into something more science-centric. It was also an attempt to stop Russian militarization of space like mounting guns on stations (Salyut 3's 23mm cannon) or building more space battle platforms (Polyus). In fact, parts of the old Polyus system are now part of the Zarya module on the ISS. Seems like win-win for international cooperation, science, and peace.
  - lexicality 10y ago
    Space hotel? Habitats? Micro-g factories? All that expansion into space that was supposed to happen regardless of the impracticalities.
fillskills 10y ago
There is very little information about the sensors themselves. Would love to find out more if someone has that information.
- Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
  >The first-generation models will weigh 5 grams but the team wants to get them down to just one, which would allow them to track even the lightest fliers like swifts. Each tag comes equipped with a solar panel, GPS, and a huge memory, and can measure acceleration, temperature, bearing, pressure, light intensity, and more. Unlike the smallest current data-loggers, they can transmit information, too. They can even be reprogrammed from space. I thought this was a pretty decent amount of info for a non-tech news source.
  - fillskills 10y ago
    Good point. Just looking to see if there is more details on how the sensors were made so small and still able to transmit their location. It just blows my mind.
- kersny 10y ago
  The Datasheet on their site has some tech details: http://icarusinitiative.org/sites/default/files/ICARUS%20SP%20Datasheet%20A3%20%282%29.pdf http://icarusinitiative.org/sites/default/files/ICARUS%20SP%... That one doesn't seem to be loading for me, but the Internet Archive has a version: https://web.archive.org/web/20160331224522/http://icarusinitiative.org/sites/default/files/ICARUS%20SP%20Datasheet%20A3%20%282%29.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20160331224522/http://icarusinit...

87 points by Hooke 10y ago

Interesting, but why involve the ISS? Putting a receiver/relay into orbit seems the perfect job for a small cube sat, or just a regular com sat. Why all the hassle and delay of human spaceflight? And, being on the ISS, the receiver will be stuck in the ISS orbit. that means not tracking anything at higher latitudes higher than the ISS inclination (ie the far north/south above/below 52*).

InclinedPlane 10y ago
Because there are already regular delivery trips to the ISS, and the cost of such experiments is thus substantially subsidized by ISS operations. A cube sat would have a very limited lifespan and cost more than their program budget on its own, besides being too limited to be useful. If their program proves successful they might be able to raise enough money to put hosted payloads on other spacecraft, one of the best being Iridium NEXT. But for now the ISS is their best shot.
russellalbert 10y ago
Would be so much better if there were more than one ISS around the globe and use it for this kind of role to stop putting lots of little satellites up.

lexicality 10y ago

It makes me oddly sad that it's "the" space station. The SciFi fan in me thinks we should shove a couple more up there to keep it company.

nacnud 10y ago
China has Tiangong-1 [1], which is their first step towards a space station. You can spot it with the naked eye [2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong-1 [2] http://www.n2yo.com/?s=37820 http://www.n2yo.com/?s=37820
ucaetano 10y ago
Or you can think the other way around: it is THE space station because countries around the world collaborated to create one large one, instead of each one trying to launch a single small one. There is a lot of synergy from having a single large space station vs. many of small ones.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
  More of an emacs philosophy than a unix one.
knz 10y ago
I agree but there is the small issue of cost. I've read before that the ISS was the most expensive project in global history at > $150B. I used google to confirm the cost and was stuck by 1) the fact that "Is the International Space Station real" was in the autocomplete options, and 2) How bloody expensive the War on Terror was/is ($1.7 Trillion according to Google).
- InclinedPlane 10y ago
  The ISS's cost was substantially due to the cost of the Shuttle program. Building an equivalent space station today using the rockets and systems we have available now would likely be considerably cheaper, by a factor of 10 or more.
  - jessriedel 10y ago
    Do you have cites to support this? My intuition says that only holds if you compare shuttle-as-it-was with other-rockets-as-hoped.
    - InclinedPlane 10y ago
      It should almost go without saying. The Shuttle was one of the most expensive launch vehicles in history. There are several helpful counterpoints to hand though. Two being the history Russian and Chinese space stations. All of them, including the Russian components of the ISS, have been vastly less expensive per module than the US components of ISS. Even if you factor in building and launching modules by US standards on US rockets it's still vastly less expensive than using the Shuttle. Moreover, we've already seen that it's possible for US companies to deliver spacecraft to the ISS in the commercial cargo program. It would actually be just as easy to deliver components to the station using similar systems for about the same cost as a cargo launch today (around $150 mil at the high end). Over the roughly 2 dozen assembly flights for the Shuttle assembled side of the ISS that works out to an equivalent cost of about $4 billion, plus extra module construction costs. Keeping in mind that such flights have already been used or are being planned to use for adding modules to the ISS (such as BEAM and IDA).
drzaiusapelord 10y ago
The entire point of the ISS was to consolidate all the efforts and budgets of various space programs and build one trans-national station. Why would you participate in this and then also build a second one? What benefit would you get? This is like saying its depressing that there's only one internet. Arguably, without the ISS there probably wouldn't be any space stations. Stations were falling out of fashion by the 90s and even before were largely propagandist projects. The ISS was an attempt to turn all this wasted effort into something world usable (not just for the space faring powers of the time) and into something more science-centric. It was also an attempt to stop Russian militarization of space like mounting guns on stations (Salyut 3's 23mm cannon) or building more space battle platforms (Polyus). In fact, parts of the old Polyus system are now part of the Zarya module on the ISS. Seems like win-win for international cooperation, science, and peace.
- lexicality 10y ago
  Space hotel? Habitats? Micro-g factories? All that expansion into space that was supposed to happen regardless of the impracticalities.

fillskills 10y ago

There is very little information about the sensors themselves. Would love to find out more if someone has that information.

Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
>The first-generation models will weigh 5 grams but the team wants to get them down to just one, which would allow them to track even the lightest fliers like swifts. Each tag comes equipped with a solar panel, GPS, and a huge memory, and can measure acceleration, temperature, bearing, pressure, light intensity, and more. Unlike the smallest current data-loggers, they can transmit information, too. They can even be reprogrammed from space. I thought this was a pretty decent amount of info for a non-tech news source.
- fillskills 10y ago
  Good point. Just looking to see if there is more details on how the sensors were made so small and still able to transmit their location. It just blows my mind.
kersny 10y ago
The Datasheet on their site has some tech details: http://icarusinitiative.org/sites/default/files/ICARUS%20SP%20Datasheet%20A3%20%282%29.pdf http://icarusinitiative.org/sites/default/files/ICARUS%20SP%... That one doesn't seem to be loading for me, but the Internet Archive has a version: https://web.archive.org/web/20160331224522/http://icarusinitiative.org/sites/default/files/ICARUS%20SP%20Datasheet%20A3%20%282%29.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20160331224522/http://icarusinit...