How the ISS Will Reenter Earth's Atmosphere

Given the recent scare that a falling NASA satellite gave a lot of people, it's worthy to mention that the same type of panic will not occur when the International Space Station (ISS) will be deorbited. At this time, the maneuver is expected to be carried out in 2020.

The orbital lab is as large as a football field, and tips the scales at around 450 tons (990,000 pounds). However, unlike the NASA Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS), it will not reenter Earth's atmosphere randomly.

The 6.5-ton spacecraft that crashed today was out of control, taken out of its orbit ahead of time, and influenced by factors that experts did not account for. But things will be totally different for the ISS. Rather than threatening inhabited areas, the giant structure will be dropped in the ocean.

Orbital experts will set the station on a course that will see as much of it as possible being burned up and disintegrated in the upper atmosphere. The pieces that will survive the fiery temperatures of atmospheric reentry will most likely make their way into the Pacific Ocean.

Given that the ISS is an international endeavor, all countries and space agencies involved in constructing the facility will also be involved in eliminating it. The Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos) has experience with such maneuvers.

The agency operated the Mir space station in low-Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001. After completing 86,331 orbits around the planet, the facility was deorbited on March 23, 2001, and its debris fell in the southern Pacific Ocean.

A similar approach will be used for the ISS as well. Considering that three quarters of the world is covered in water, it shouldn't be so hard to guide the massive structure on a course that will take it away from even sparsely-populated areas.

“We've done a lot of studies. We have found an orbit and a change in velocity that we believe is achievable, and it creates a debris footprint that’s all in water in an unpopulated area,” said the NASA space station program deputy manager, Kirk Shireman, as quoted by Space.

“We've been working on plans and update the plans periodically. We don’t want to ever be in a position where we couldn’t safely deorbit the station. It's been a part of the program from the very beginning,” he concluded.