From the outside, the design of Axiom’s space station looks remarkably similar to the ISS. The cylindrical modules are about 15 meters in diameter and are attached to a giant tinker toy-like station. The reason for this, Suffredini says, is to take advantage of the space industry’s familiarity with the ISS. European aerospace company Thales Alenia Space, one of Axiom’s main contractors for its modules, also built about half the modules for the ISS. Axiom’s station is also blocked by the size of existing launch vehicles. As big rockets like SpaceX’s Starship arrive, it will be able to make large space stations possible. For example, Suffredini says Axium is exploring the idea of using inflatable modules in the future. This will be similar to NASA’s TransAhb, the ISS module concept developed by the agency in the 1990s before the project was canceled by Congress. The modules of the Axiom can be spherical or toroidal and each can be three times larger in diameter than the conventional hard-shell model.
Suffredini expects Axiom’s station to be used by a variety of customers; Like the ISS, it will serve as a research platform for government space agencies and commercial companies. It will also be the destination of the first wave of space travelers, which is why Axiom is an ISS. Made the interior more luxurious than the convenience of simplicity. The decor of the crew module was dreamed up by renowned interior designer Philip Stark and will come with plush, upholstered, walls, windows and color changing LEDs. But Axiom is not waiting for its arrival in orbit to further its space tourism business. After securing its docking port from NASA, the company struck a deal with SpaceX to send four private astronauts, one of whom turned out to be Tom Cruise, who will be shooting the film on the station – to ISS by the end of next year.
It is an ambitious program for such a small company. Axiom has less than 100 employees, but what is lacking in shape makes it into experience. Prior to honoring Xiom, Suffredini spent a decade working at NASA as ISS’s program manager, and he says the experience will help Axiom succeed where others have failed. And has been there A lot Plans for private space stations that never succeeded.
The idea for commercial space stations is as old as Space Age. Many years before Buzz and Neil made their giant leap, hoteliers and defense contractors were planning for orbital hiltones and 100-person space stations. In the 1960s, the ecosystem of living in human devotion and working in orbit seemed to be a few decades away. But building larger space stations became harder and more expensive than anyone could have imagined.
Before a twinkle in ISS NASA’s eye, the agency made its first foray into outside world hospitality with Skylab, which can host up to three astronauts at a time. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, Russia built small space stations – first Saliot and then Mir. It was a start, but it wasn’t exactly Space Station V, the huge orbital cycle depicted in Stanley Kubrick’s Magnum Opus, 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Only three astronaut crew were housed in NASA’s Skylab before the agency released them into the atmosphere in the summer of 1979. Everything in orbit eventually lands on Earth, and Skylab had no way of maintaining its alt altitude without a space shuttle, which did not take its first flight until 1981. But NASA did not abandon the idea of a space station. Next year, the agency formed a space station task force to begin design work on its next pay generation orbit, Freedom. The station was intended to host eight astronauts at a time and would have been built with contributions from Canada, Japan and several European countries. The station seemed remarkably similar to what the ISS would become; In fact, NASA says about 75 percent of the hardware design for the International Space Station was for original independence.
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