NASA's International Space Station or the ISS is planned to crash into the Pacific Ocean during its upcoming retirement in a few years from now, or in 2031 to be more exact.
The NASA logo on a protective box for a camera near the space shuttle Endeavour April 28, 2011 at Kennedy Space Center in Florida as preparations are under way for an April 29 launch of Endeavour, which will be its last flight. AFP PHOTO/Stan HONDA
NASA's International Space Station
As per a news story by CNN, NASA or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration recently released its plans for the aging Space Station, now that it is years away from its much-needed retirement.
It further includes what the United States space agency plans to do once the ISS needs to conclude its operation in orbiting the Earth.
It is worth noting, though, that NASA is hopeful that its Space Station could serve astronauts from various space agencies across the world until the last month of 2030.
The ISS was launched into space more than two decades ago. CNN noted in the same report that in that span of time, it has already housed over 200 astronauts, which not only came from the US but in 18 other nations as well.
The director of the International Space Station at the headquarters of NASA, Robyn Gaten, issued a statement, saying that the third decade of the ISS is "the most productive."
In fact, according to a report by IGN, the director further said that NASA is looking "forward to maximizing these returns from the space station," which means that it is not slowing down until the retirement of the ISS in 2030.
On top of that, Gaten added that the space agency is also working on the transition to commercial space stations ahead of the retirement of the ISS.
NASA's International Space Station to Crash Into Pacific Ocean
The transition report of the ISS disclosed that NASA is planning to crash the orbiting space station back to Earth in January 2031.
In this handout image provided by the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA, the International Space Station and the docked space shuttle Endeavour orbit Earth during Endeavour's final sortie on May 23, 2011 in Space. Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli captured the first-ever images of an orbiter docked to the International Space Station from the viewpoint of a departing vessel as he returned to Earth in a Soyuz capsule.
Crashing a space station back to Earth is actually old news for NASA. In fact, the space agency also retired its first-ever space station, the SkyLab, to our home planet.
However, IGN highlighted in the same news story that the re-entry of the SkyLab has become infamous as the space station ended up breaking into pieces, wherein its debris hit some parts of Australia.
As such, it appears that NASA is planning to prevent another SkyLab incident as it intends to end the reign of the ISS into a remote area in the South Pacific Ocean that goes by the name Point Nemo.
The secluded area in the ocean has been aptly called the "spacecraft cemetery" as countries like the US and Russia have been throwing their space junk in the said location since 1971.
Related Article: NASA is Decommissioning the ISS by 2031-Extends Support from 2024 to 2030 But Will They Destroy It?
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Written by Teejay Boris
