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Stationed in the Stars
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Program Overview
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On December 2nd 1998, the space shuttle Endeavour blasted off from
Cape Kennedy carrying the first stage of the world's most ambitious
and expensive engineering venture of all time. If all goes as
planned, by 2004 the US and its 14 international partners will have
launched 460 tons of hardware into orbit 220 miles above earth.
These components will be assembled in a space station as big as two
football fields and weighing a million pounds. The station will
offer at least eight interior spaces for living, storage, or lab
research. Its solar panels - among the largest structures ever
placed in orbit - will generate 45 kilowatts of power. The bill will
come to at least $50 billion.
The International Space Station got off to a shaky start in the
early 1980s, when its design was constantly at the whim of
fluctuating budgets and successive NASA engineers. In the era of
glasnost, the project got a new lease of life when it was perceived
as an effective way of reaching out to the beleaguered Russian space
agency. Fraught with funding issues and political tensions, the
collaboration highlighted the different styles of its engineers.
NASA engineers tend to think on a big—sometimes too
ambitious—scale, while the Russians have concentrated on
low-cost, improvised solutions to such problems as long-term life
support for the astronauts on board.
NOVA's profile of the ISS will focus on a crucial turning point in
the project as the Russians finally deliver the vital Service
Module, which they've been constructing for almost 15 years. NOVA
will take viewers inside the excitement and risks of the shuttle
mission that will place this third key component of ISS in orbit.
Assuming the mission succeeds, NASA hopes that ISS will begin to
silence its many critics and start to realize its scientific
potential. Our show will paint a vivid picture of the third mission,
the risks and hazards of long-term operations in space, and the
vision and audacity that lie behind this extraordinary project.
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