Russia warns of the risks of a fall of the International Space Station

In a new series of tweets, Dmitry Rogozin, the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, claims that the sanctions against Russia could cause the fall of the international space station (ISS). And to publish a map of the world where the ISS could fall, not failing to point out that a very large part of Russian territory was sheltered.

These sanctions imposed on Russia are very targeted. They target banks, corporations, oligarchs and those close to Russian power with unprecedented vigor to make flex the Russian economy in such a way as to force Vladimir Putin to give up her war in Ukraine. They do not target the Space Station and therefore obviously do not aim to prevent the proper functioning of the Russian segment or control operations.

The Space Station, which sits on a orbit low at about 400 kilometers from the Earth, must regularly rise in altitude and maneuver thanks to the impulses given by the Russian Progress cargo ships, which regularly supply it. By implying that the Russian segment of the station, which is used in particular to correct the orbit of the station, could no longer be supplied, the boss of Roscosmos is lying. Indeed, if the ISS is no longer supplied with fuel, it would become uncontrollable. But today this is not the case.

A Cygnus freighter tested to ascend the orbit of the Space Station

In this eventuality, the Nasa must experiment within a few weeks with a solution to compensate for a possible Russian failure, with the Cygnus OA-17 module, docked with the ISS on February 21. This Cygnus freighter is the first to have improved capabilities that should allow it to perform a reboost, using its engines to adjust the orbit of the Space Station. Furthermore, Elon Musk responded to Rogozin’s threats by stating that SpaceX could also provide altitude keeping for the ISS. Together, the Dragon and Cygnus freighters would have the theoretical capability to provide the required thrust.

In the meantime, despite all this, crew rotations continue. On April 15, SpaceX’s Crew 4 mission will take off with four astronauts including the European Samantha Cristoforetti who will be the first European woman to take command of the International Space Station. On March 18, three cosmonauts Russians will take off aboard a Soyuz from the cosmodrome Baikonur to reach the station. On March 30, the American Mark Vande Hei and the Russians, Anton Chkaplerov and Pïotr Doubrov, must return to earth from the ISS, aboard a Soyuz spacecraft. Finally, the trade mission Axiom-1, whose launch is scheduled for March 30, is not in question. On board, three private astronauts and a professional astronaut who will stay 10 days aboard the orbital complex.

Could Russia Really Bring the Space Station Down on the United States?

Article of Remy Decourt published on 05/03/2022

While many people worry about the fate of the International Space Station, US military experts are most concerned about the November 15, 2021 Asat launch, so unlikely is Russia to “go after” the orbital complex. With this Asat shot, some observers wonder if the Russians have not prepared hostilities in space on the fringes of the conflict with Ukraine. Our explanations.

If, in space, relations between the Russians and their Western and Japanese partners in the International Space Station (ISS) program have always been cordial and pragmatic, the situation has evolved unfavorably. As the European Space Agency, engaged in several programs with Russia, reminds us, ” even in times of great political tension, space missions have always been examples of peaceful and practical cooperation in the field of science and technology, for the benefit of humanity “.

But, it is to be feared that tomorrow space cooperation with Russia in new programs will be more difficult, if not impossible. That said, despite the strong tensions between Putin and Biden, it is obviously very unlikely that the master of the Kremlin will decide to “attack” the ISS as some statements by Russian officials and senior officials might suggest. .

While Russia can easily disrupt the proper functioning of the orbital complex, even uncontrollably deorbit it and bring it back to Earth, it is not as simple as it sounds. As explained in a previous article, in January 2031, the end of life of the ISS, three Russian Progress cargo ships will be needed to deorbit it in a controlled manner above point Nemo. Today, the single Progress cargo ship docked at the ISS is not enough for this.

In the worst-case scenario, Putin could order the Russian cosmonauts aboard the ISS to evacuate it, then turn on the engines of the Progress by accelerating very strongly with a bias to bring it into as low an orbit as possible until at a stage where it would no longer be possible to reassemble it. Among the other possibilities, that of generating a very strong torque so as to make it spin on itself in an irretrievable way.

In both cases, NASA could do nothing. It clearly demonstrated the theoretical feasibility of ascending the Station’s orbit using a cargo ship Cygnus except that they are of no use for this type of maneuver because the ports on which the Cygnus moor are not aligned in the right direction. This is also why theEuropean Space Agency ATV docked in the same place as the Russian Progress freighters to ascend the Station’s orbit.

Conflict in Ukraine: what if the Russians had also prepared hostilities in space

Let’s face it, the Russians won’t forcibly deorbit the ISS because they have no way of controlling its reentry so that what won’t be destroyed while traversing theatmosphere could crash on Russian or Chinese territory or on one of its allies! Added to this is that the Russian part is still worth several billion dollars and they plan to use it until 2030.

Nevertheless, the Russians do have a power to nuisance in low orbit. And this is perhaps where the situation could be most problematic for Americans and Europeans. According to several specialists, the Russians may have prepared a new form of war asymmetric with the Asat shot of November 15, 2021 when a missile destroyed one of their old electronic eavesdropping satellites. Either way, the destruction of a satellite in flight is not new but what has changed in this case, and very few people realized it at first, is that this Asat shot had the hidden objective of disrupting the proper functioning of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites which are in a complementary orbit.

The distribution of debris as produced by the explosion of the satellite was certainly intended to constrain the satellites star link to perform many maneuvers. You should know that the Russian debris generates bursts, clusters of alerts for many satellites! And that is unprecedented.

A cloud of debris with unprecedented behavior…

Usually after the destruction of a satellitethe cloud of debris lost all its cohesion after 6 to 12 months, which does not seem to be the case with this cloud. In retrospect, one can think that the Asat firing of November 15 allowed the Russians, and this is a strong and rather surprising hypothesis, to train for today’s situation. Not to threaten the International Space Station but to disrupt the operation of many American satellites, whether they are civilian and military observation satellites or those of the constellation Starlink.

You should know that the impact against the satellite had the particularity of increments low speeds so that the debris did not disperse as usual. It is necessary to note theintelligence of the maneuver. The debris, with an inclination of about 82°, is also complementary to the 98° inclination which is the inclination of sun-synchronous satellites.

This orbit is used by many observation, meteorological or remote sensing satellites for example. As a result, this gives a very large number of collision risk alerts with, potentially, frontal collisions by package. As if a submachine gun were shooting hundreds of pieces of debris in the direction of a satellite!

Concretely, rather than frontally attacking an American military satellite, typically of the Keyhole type, the idea would be to destroy a Russian satellite which is nearby, so that the cloud of debris generated, subjects the satellite to “strafing”. debris in order…