NASA has revealed its $1 billion plan to crash the International Space Station (ISS) back to Earth.

The space agency is set to decommission the orbiting laboratory in 2031 due to stresses on the structure that have accumulated over time.

NASA will pay any company that creates a ‘space-tug’ design, a craft powerful enough to pull the ISS from its orbit and send it toward our planet.

The agency is calling the space tug a US Deorbit Vehicle (USDV), which will nudge the ISS from 175 miles above Earth’s surface to about 75 miles, where it will begin its final descent into the Pacific Ocean. 

Proposals are due no later than November 17, and the ISS retirement plan will begin in 2026 when NASA lets the craft start to decay naturally.

The plan’s first step is to let the ship begin to decay and not re-boost it so it stays in orbit.

During this time, the atmospheric drag will reduce the orbit from around 250 miles above the surface to 200 miles.

However, this will take a few years to happen.

In 2030, the crew on the ISS will make the final descent to Earth and bring any crucial equipment.

The ISS will continue to move closer to Earth, reaching the ‘Point of no return’ at 175 miles above the surface.

And this is where the $1 billion space tug will swoop in and give the ISS a little push from orbit.

The station will begin re-entry between 75 miles and 50 miles above the surface.

The external skin of modules will melt away, and then the exposed hardware will vaporize as the ISS soars 18,000 miles per hour through Earth’s atmosphere.

Any of it that survives re-entry will be targeted to fall in Point Nemo, a region of the Pacific Ocean between New Zealand and South America often used as a spacecraft graveyard – at least 260 craft have been laid to rest there.

‘The decommissioning plan for the space station is the execution of a responsible, controlled, and targeted deorbit into a remote ocean area,’ NASA shared in a statement.

During descent through the Earth’s atmosphere, the space station would burn, break up, and vaporize into fragments of various sizes. 

‘Some fragments would likely survive the thermal stresses of re-entry. Environmental impacts of these fragments within the anticipated impact area are expected to be small. 

‘To best protect people and property on Earth, the most remote areas of the ocean are targeted.’

President Ronald Regan announced the construction of the ISS during his January 25, 1984 State of the Union Address, noting NASA will have it completed in 10 years.

Then, on December 4, 1998, the first US component of the ship launched, and two years later, it officially began operation.

The station has hosted more than 250 visitors from 20 countries since the first crew arrived in November 2000. 

NASA originally planned to decommission the ISS after 15 years of operation – but that timeline has since been surpassed.

But the massive orbiting laboratory shows wear and tear, forcing NASA to say farewell to its faithful ship.

The station’s safe deorbit is the shared responsibility of the five space agencies — including NASA, CSA (Canadian Space Agency), (ESA) European Space Agency, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency), and the State Space Corporation Roscosmos.

Each is responsible for managing and controlling the hardware it provides.

The station was designed to be interdependent and relies on contributions from across the partnership.

The US, Japan, Canada, and ESA participating countries have committed to operating the station through 2030 and Russia through at least 2028.

NASA said it examined several options for decommissioning the ISS, including disassembly and return to Earth, boosting it to a higher orbit to stay in space or leaving it in orbit to decay until it randomly falls to Earth.

The other options fail because the structure was not designed to be easily disassembled in space, the craft needs to be re-boosted to stay in orbit and allowing it to decay in orbit could pose risks on Earth.

NASA does not want the ISS’s retirement to be the end of its hold over space and has already launched a replacement plant. 

The American space agency does not want to lose access to these benefits when the station ends, so it has launched a transition plan – asking private companies to develop a space station. 

Multiple companies want to operate a commercial station, including Axiom Space, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin and Northrup Grumman.

‘The International Space Station is entering its third and most productive decade as a groundbreaking scientific platform in microgravity,’ said Robyn Gatens, director of the International Space Station at NASA Headquarters.

‘This third decade is one of the results, building on our successful global partnership to verify exploration and human research technologies to support deep space exploration, continue to return medical and environmental benefits to humanity, and lay the groundwork for a commercial future in low-Earth orbit.

BUSINESS LIVE: Shop price inflation hits record high; Asda to buy petrol station operator; Home REIT kept in dark by investment adviser

By Live Commentary

Updated: 08:02 EDT, 30 May 2023

Some links in this article may be affiliate links. If you click on them we may earn a small commission. That helps us fund This Is Money, and keep it free to use. We do not write articles to promote products. We do not allow any commercial relationship to affect our editorial independence.

POPULAR MONEY SECTIONS
Take me to…

Eamonn Holmes has blasted ITV as he accuses the company of covering up Phillip Schofield‘s affair – as channel staff are left bewildered by the bombshell confession. 

Last night staff at the network were left stunned at Phillip Schofield’s revelation – as well as suspicious of their bosses and just if and what they knew about one of their biggest stars and his much younger male friend.

ITV’s press office slammed their former star presenter’s ‘admissions of deceit’ – essentially throwing the man who was once the biggest star under the bus.. The channel confirmed that they had accepted his resignation and that he would not be hosting the British Soap Awards. 

But at the helm of the channel is a group of executives is would be hard to believe were not aware of the allegations. 

Schofield admitted the affair, which he claimed was ‘unwise but not illegal’, in a lengthy statement released on Friday, in which he also apologised to his wife and family.  

Holmes – who previously presented the show alongside wife Ruth Langsford – continued to make a string of allegations suggesting station bosses knew of allegations against Schofield and ‘never once took action’. 

The 63-year-old broadcaster – who formerly presented on This Morning alongside Schofield, 61 – sensationally claimed bosses knew ‘what kind of man’ the star was and did not take action. 

He said: ‘Schofield has finally been caught out, but he’s not the only guilty party.’ 

In a later tweet, the former This Morning presenter claimed he and his wife Ruth Langsford had been ‘deceived’ about the allegations and promised that: ‘One day I will tell the story’.

He said the couple had been ‘taken for fools’.

An ITV spokesman said: ‘We are deeply disappointed by the admissions of deceit made tonight by Phillip Schofield.

‘The relationships we have with those we work with are based on trust. Philip made assurances to us which he now acknowledges were untrue and we feel badly let down.

‘We accept his resignation from ITV and therefore can confirm that he will not be appearing on ITV as had previously been stated.’

This has been echoed by MailOnline columnist and GB News host Dan Wootton, who said the broadcaster now faces ‘huge questions’.

He continued to claim that there had been ‘widespread outrage that management allowed this to go on for so long’. 

Wootton said one of the station’s biggest stars contacted him to allege a ‘cover-up’ had taken place. 

In a second tweet, he went on to slam the broadcasters as ‘woke’.

He went on to urge all senior executives at the company to step down – saying that it was the reason he left ITV in 2019.

The claim has since been re-tweeted by ex-Loose Women host Carol McGiffin.

It comes after she hit out at Schofield for being ‘so b****y rude’ last week.

Broadcaster and columnist Piers Morgan simply reshared the initial article from The Mail with a short phrase to convey his shock: ‘Blimey…’  

And occasional This Morning presenter Carol Voderman said on the BBC’s Have I Got News For You on Friday night that her money is on Alison Hammond to replace Schofield. 

Asked by co-host Ian Hislop if the presenters will be ‘Holly n Carol’, she replied: ‘No. Probably Holly and Alison, I would have thought. That’s where I’d put my money.’ 

Host for the evening Steph McGovern agreed, adding: ‘I suppose it’s always going to be really difficult, isn’t it, when there’s a bit of rift between a much loved TV duo.’ 

Questions have been asked about whether the executives at the top of ITV knew about the relationship. 

An insider told The Sun: ‘This goes right to the top. Very senior heads could roll. If there’s any suggestions of a cover-up they could be culpable. 

‘It’s also possible that This Morning could end up getting the axe.’  

Chief Executive Carolyn McCall and her PR sidekick Paul Moore who she brought with her from Easyjet in 2018 were running the organisation at the time, along with Director of Television Kevin Lygo.

Both Ms McCall and Lygo are understood to have been allies of Schofield and extremely supportive of him. 

Also around at the time as ITV’s head of daytime Emma Gormley. She was, and still is, the overseer of the channel’s 6am until 6pm programmes, which include Good Morning Britain, Lorraine and of course, This Morning. 

Then there is the show’s editor Martin Frizell, who was for so many years very close to Schofield and for many years was the one who ‘cleared up his presenter’s mess.’

There have, of course, been many rumours about Schofield and his much younger colleague swirling around the television industry for a little over three years.

It is thought to have all started in January 2020.

Phillip Schofield admitted on Friday to having a relationship with a much younger man who worked with him on This Morning, and later lying about it. 

In a bombshell statement to the Daily Mail, the veteran TV presenter admitted that he and the man began a relationship that was more than a friendship. 

The ex-TV presenter describes this as ‘unwise but not illegal’.

Schofield further confessed that he lied to his employer ITV, to his colleagues, his friends and his agents at the management firm YMU.

He also lied to The Mail on Sunday, the Daily Mail’s sister paper, which first exclusively described his relationship with the younger man earlier this month.

Schofield’s extraordinary statement concludes weeks of increasingly fevered speculation in both the TV industry and the wider country about the future of his career, following his sudden departure from the This Morning sofa earlier this month.

He is now expected to step back from public life, with a source close to the presenter admitting to The Sun: ‘There’s no coming back from this.’ 

‘Those who have defended him are horrified to find out it is all true – he’s been misleading ITV and even his own team for years.’ 

Last week Holmes tore into Phillip Schofield for claiming he was leaving of his own accord after 20 years, declaring: ‘He was sacked’, as the crisis-hit show kicked off with a short tribute to the star.

Reacting to newspaper headlines saying Schofield had stepped down, the GB News breakfast show raged: ‘Oh please just stop this. He was sacked. All this nonsense of “I’ve decided to step down”. I’m sure you did – here’s your P45 now step down’.

He also suggested Holly Willoughby was being duplicitous when she claimed to be sad that Mr Schofield was leaving the hit ITV show after two decades at the helm, adding: ‘They deserve each other’. 

Holmes then went on to mimic Holly and said: ‘And she says: ‘Oh, the couch will not be the same without him being there’. Well she wanted him not there.  So what is she moaning about. They deserve each other I suppose’.

He went on: ‘Holly is being as false as he is and nobody is talking about the elephant in the room.

‘She says ‘”I thank him for all his knowledge, experience and humour”. All the things that she didn’t have when she came to the show. 

‘Well it’s true! I would call that stabbing in the back.

‘I could give you a list of the lack of kindness and lack of awareness from both of them. How they would socialise, and the people around them. 

‘You just have to look at my phone, full of people who are glad to see the back of the two of them’.

Schofield’s exit from ITV apparently scotches plans for the ‘prime time’ show he was allegedly offered by the network as consolation for leaving This Morning after more than 20 years on the show.

He had been due to present the prestigious British Soap Awards next week – a role he had performed since 2006. His statement confirms he will no longer do so. 

In his grovelling apology, Schofield said: ‘I am making this statement via the Daily Mail, to whom I have already apologised personally for misleading, through my lawyer who I also misled, about a story [sic] which they wanted to write about me a few days ago.

‘The first thing I want to say is: I am deeply sorry for having lied to them, and to many others about a relationship that I had with someone working on This Morning. 

‘I did have a consensual on-off relationship with a younger male colleague at This Morning. 

‘Contrary to speculation, whilst I met the man when he was a teenager and was asked to help him to get into television, it was only after he started to work on the show that it became more than a just a friendship. 

‘That relationship was unwise, but not illegal. It is now over…

‘I am painfully conscious that I have lied to my employers at ITV, to my colleagues and friends, to my agents, to the media and therefore the public and most importantly of all to my family. 

‘I am so very, very sorry, as I am for having been unfaithful to my wife…

‘I am resigning from ITV with immediate effect, expressing my immense gratitude to them for all the amazing opportunities that they have given me.

‘I will reflect on my very bad judgement in both participating in the relationship and then lying about it.’

The Mail is aware of the younger man’s identity, but has chosen not to name him.

Talent agency YMU, who represent entertainers, athletes and musicians, dropped the former This Morning presenter after 35 years following the bombshell revelation.

In a statement, Mary Bekhait, the Group CEO of YMU Group, said: ‘Honesty and integrity are core values for YMU’s whole business, defining everything we do.

‘Talent management is a relationship based entirely on trust.

‘This week, we have learned important new information about our client Phillip Schofield.

‘These facts contradicted what Phillip had previously told YMU, as well as the external advisors we had brought in to support him.

‘As a result, on Thursday we agreed to part company with Phillip, with immediate effect.’