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> in March, Nasa asked Congress for funding to start development of a "space tug" that might be needed to perform the task – a spacecraft that can push the stat
by zeagle 3y ago
> in March, Nasa asked Congress for funding to start development of a "space tug" that might be needed to perform the task – a spacecraft that can push the station back into the atmosphere. Kathy Leuders, head of Nasa's human spaceflight programme, later revealed it was estimated the tug vehicle would cost just shy of $1bn (£800m).
This part sounds insane. Use a docked Progress, Soyuz or Dragon to give it the right calculated nudges at a fraction of the cost. There is complexity, angular momentum and rotation in there I'm sure but NASA is good at rocket science, why develop a new vehicle.
- wefarrell 3y agoOne billion dollars is only 1/43rd of a Twitter. That sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
- zeagle 3y agoI guess that works if you feel Twitter is valued reasonably (or even has a positive value on a societal level with externalities). I don't work in tech so have a different view on the wild west of the tech industry than most on that here. Maybe a better comparison is cost of 30 ICE3 trains for 1 billion euros[1]. [1] https://www.globalrailwayreview.com/news/104428/deutsche-bahn-order-new-ice-trains/ https://www.globalrailwayreview.com/news/104428/deutsche-bah...
- danpalmer 3y agoProgress/Soyuz/Dragon don’t have the delta-V necessary to be able to de orbit 400 tonnes. It may be possible to refuel one of the repeatedly to achieve that over multiple burns, but that’s a complex job over months with multiple refuelling missions required and likely new hardware to support that.