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Celebrate one of humanities greatest engineering achievements – The International Space Station – a meteor proof lab bigger than a football field, constructed by astronauts traveling 250 miles above us at 17,500 miles an hour.
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00:00Today, we're stepping into uncharted territory. Boldly going to check out a construction project
00:05that's like nothing on earth. A structure so incredible, it's out of this world. No,
00:10literally, out of this world. How do you construct humanity's greatest technical achievement?
00:18250 miles above the earth. Would all these things fit together for the very first time
00:26meeting in space? Spoiler alert, it doesn't go per plan. How do you convince earth's brightest
00:32minds to dedicate decades to its creation? The number of people involved worldwide to make this
00:40a success, it's an engineering wonder. How do you build it when the technology doesn't even exist?
00:47It's all brand new equipment being used for the first time. We had to deal with failure after
00:52failure. How do you get people to live where the risks are enormous? It has to be perfect
00:58because it has to sustain human life. And so are the rewards. It's possible in the future that we
01:05could be printing full organs and transporting them back to earth. Welcome to a world where anything
01:11is possible. The space where innovation and creativity collide. This isn't just impressive,
01:21it's revolutionary. It's revolutionary. Where the only limit is human imagination.
01:27This wasn't just ambitious, it was audacious. No one had ever attempted anything like it.
01:36Unpacking the miracles and mysteries of construction.
01:40Unpacking the miracles of construction. Sometimes buildings can change the world. And this is one of
01:46them. To ask, how did they build that? What am I talking about? The International Space Station.
01:59250 miles up there, traveling 17,500 miles an hour. It's an amazing achievement with an incredible story.
02:09It's 1984. And President Ronald Reagan has ambitions to conquer space. The first is a commitment to build a
02:20permanently manned space station to be in orbit around the earth within a decade. It'll be a base
02:26for many kinds of scientific, commercial, and industrial activities, and a stepping stone for further goals.
02:32But America won't be taking this giant step alone. International cooperation has long been a guiding
02:41principle of the United States space program. Our friends and allies will be invited to join with us
02:46in the space station project. Three, two, one, zero. All engines running.
03:01The International Space Station became fully operational on May 19, 2011.
03:07But its story begins many years earlier. Back in time and down here on earth.
03:12The idea of building a space station has existed for about 100 years at this point.
03:19There had been some efforts in the 1970s independently, so the United States and the Soviet Union,
03:26to build a space station. They both had success. We in the United States had the Skylab mission.
03:33And the USSR had solute. But these were small and sat in a low orbit, which meant they only lasted a few years
03:40before they were abandoned to burn up in the atmosphere. This new station not only has to last
03:46for decades, but very importantly, it needs to be a research center where the boundaries of science are pushed.
03:52When you're in a microgravity environment, you can do these things that are just not possible on earth.
03:59There are incredible advancements that we can find when we research in microgravity,
04:04from everything from vaccine development, to research in muscular dystrophy, to even growing
04:09organs in orbit, from looking at stem cells and maybe bringing those back down to earth one day.
04:16The plan is to create an orbiting space laboratory for research that's impossible to do on earth.
04:22And over its 15 year lifespan, test technologies that will allow longer term space travel.
04:30On board, there will be room for seven permanent residents and guests for the occasional sleepover,
04:36as it travels around the earth every 90 minutes. But building it comes with some pretty big challenges.
04:45First, they need to figure out how to get it into space, because the space station will be bigger than
04:51anything carried up there before. And they have to make sure that when they do,
04:56whatever they build it from won't explode under the enormous pressure in space and can survive being
05:03hit by debris traveling at thousands of miles per hour. Next, they'll have to find a way for the space
05:10station to provide its own power and deal with the increasing demands as the station grows.
05:15And a system to provide clean air and water to sustain the astronauts long term missions.
05:24Finally, they will build a viewing portal, which needs to be super strong in this harshest of
05:30environments, but will give them an out of this world view. This is going to be one of the most
05:36technically complicated projects ever undertaken by humanity.
05:43So it's good news that some of the bravest and brightest from the United States, Canada,
05:50Japan and Europe are working on how to build this boundary pushing structure.
05:55Starting with how to get it up there. The finish station will weigh more than 300 automobiles
06:07with the length of almost an entire American football field. That's bigger than anything we've
06:12ever put in space before. You cannot launch that one big giant structure in one piece. So you have to
06:19build it in a modular fashion. The plan is to build 14 modules here on Earth, which will be joined together
06:29in space. From providing life support systems and laboratories to sleeping quarters and even a gym,
06:38each will be unique. But they all have to be incredibly tough. It's a bowling alley up there. There's
06:46there's orbital debris everywhere in space. It's not improbable that something really catastrophic could
06:54happen in the future. In space, everything wants to kill you. Obviously, there's no breathable air,
07:03but you're also being bombarded with radiation. And then the temperature goes from a plus 250 degrees
07:11Fahrenheit in the sunlight to a minus 455 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade. And the laws of physics
07:20dictate that any air squeezed into a spacecraft under pressure will really want to find its way out. If
07:26there are any weaknesses, the atmosphere on the station will find them. If there is a sudden leak, it can
07:33cause a decompression event where air rushes out suddenly and it could tear the entire station apart.
07:41The perfect shape for pressure is a sphere because all loads are the same and stresses are the same
07:50throughout the sphere. Which is why it's been used for unmanned satellites. But spheres don't have much
07:56usable space inside for astronauts. And they're difficult to build. A cylinder would be the next best
08:03shape because you've got curvature in the one direction. So you get nice uniform pressure.
08:08If you think of a soda can, for example, it's a cylinder. And that's to withstand that immense
08:14pressure that's coming from inside the can. And it's the same on the space station.
08:20But then, you have to figure out what to make them from.
08:24The space station module needs to be made of a material that's light enough to launch into space
08:29because every pound that we launch is actually really expensive. But it also needs to be really
08:33strong.
08:33We've made a mess of our orbits up there. We have a lot of orbital debris in our lower orbit. And then
08:42a god himself likes to throw a little micrometeorite at us from deep space.
08:46Micrometeoroids are incredibly small, usually less than a millimeter,
08:53tinier than a grain of sand. But at space speeds, they are lethal.
09:00So these things are traveling incredibly fast. You know, five kilometers a second.
09:05And then when they hit these things, they're stopping very, very quickly or they're going
09:11right through them. A collision like this in space could be catastrophic for the crew inside.
09:19Your skin would dry out and you would lose all the water in your body.
09:22Imagine building a skyscraper where the lobby is made in France, the parking lot in Texas,
09:31and the penthouse in Japan. Now, imagine stitching those pieces together under the ocean. Only,
09:38it's about a million times more difficult. Well, that's exactly what's happening in the late 1980s,
09:45when the US has welcomed friends and allies from around the world to join the most complicated
09:50construction project in human history.
09:56The first big challenge is to design modules that can survive the harshest environment, space.
10:04One, you would freeze to death. And two, you wouldn't have any air to breathe,
10:08and your skin would dry out and you would lose all the water in your body.
10:13The team turns to something originally developed by astronomer Fred Whipple in 1946 to protect
10:19spacecrafts. It's called the Whipple Shield. The way it works is that it's made up of multiple
10:25layers with a gap in the middle, and that helps to distribute the energy of the impact across those
10:29layers. So, a typical construction of a Whipple Shield is basically two aluminum plates, right, with a
10:36standoff. When a particle comes, it hits the aluminum shield and it penetrates. The particle basically
10:45breaks up and it creates almost like a plume. But the space station can't leave anything to chance.
10:54The energy released at the moment of impact is extreme. Temperatures spike to thousands of degrees,
11:02instantly melting both the micrometeorite and whatever it hits.
11:06So these Whipple Shields will have extra protection. The third layer of a Whipple Shield is Kevlar. And you
11:13might be familiar with that from something like a bulletproof vest, for example. When micrometeoroids
11:19hit Kevlar, the energy dissipates across the fibers. No shattering, no bending, just pure strength holding
11:28everything together. Next comes another layer of a fabric called Nextel. The Nextel can resist very high
11:37temperature. And Kevlar has very strong mechanical properties. So the combination of the two can
11:44disintegrate those particles.
11:50Work gets underway on the cylinder-shaped modules with their protective skin.
11:54But creating this extraordinary structure is slow going. And by the early 1990s, Congress is becoming
12:02increasingly concerned that the project is over schedule and over budget.
12:09While it might have been budgeted at a very specific dollar amount, the space station, of course,
12:15grows beyond in terms of costs. Like materials certainly increase in cost.
12:21Originally budgeted at eight billion U.S. dollars, in 1993, the space station has already cost nine
12:29billion. And the final figure is estimated to be as much as 35 billion dollars.
12:37That's where we really see this sort of pushback from Congress about exactly what kinds of things
12:43they're willing to invest money in.
12:45And the future scientific advancements that will be lost if the program is ended.
12:54But costs have spiraled with the project already one billion dollars over budget
12:59and the space station still firmly on planet Earth.
13:03On June 23, 1993, Congress votes on whether to continue with President Reagan's space project.
13:10Or whether to abandon it altogether.
13:15It was a very somber mode. We were going to lose the vote, most likely.
13:23When the votes are counted, the outcome stuns everyone.
13:27It was 216 votes to 215. The project survives by a single vote.
13:34A last-minute campaign by a group of bipartisan representatives saves the day.
13:40I think one brave politician stood up to save this marvel that we are talking about today.
13:50The space station survives. But President Clinton insists that budgets are cut.
13:58It's a very expensive effort. And so the more collaborators you have contributing
14:04technology and research and, of course, money to the effort makes it easier.
14:09It paves the way for Russia to become a partner in December 1993.
14:15We are discovery. Discovery for Volodya.
14:18We are bringing our nations closer together.
14:21For the first time in many years, the two Cold War rivals will work together to conquer space.
14:29The next time we approach, we will shake your hand and together we will lead our world into the next millennium.
14:34Phase one of this new partnership will see astronauts and cosmonauts meet on Russia's Mir-1 space station.
14:46The Mir space station becomes a great opportunity to learn how to do these things together.
14:52In 1995, the first American astronaut arrives. Six more will follow.
14:58Take the space shuttle up to a space station.
15:01Dock. Houston Atlantis, we have capture.
15:05Exchange astronauts. We're lucky and we're honored and privileged to be part of this.
15:09Allow Americans to live on a space station with people from other countries.
15:14Then I remember having, you know, some wonderful meals there and had Russian pop music playing in the background.
15:20It was really a neat cross-cultural experience with our cosmonaut colleagues.
15:25They had something called Courvoisier, which is like a cognac.
15:31You take a couple of slurps and then Vasily put the top back on and he put it away.
15:35And it really, I think, helped us bond and become friends.
15:38While it's great for fostering international relations, Mir has been in space for 10 years.
15:45And it highlights how different the international space station needs to be.
15:49They'd had a fire as well as a collision on the outside of the space station.
15:55So they had power outages. So it was mildewy, dark and dank.
15:59And I was very thankful to not have to spend four and a half months up there, quite honestly.
16:03The next challenge the team faces is how to get the space station into space.
16:11Previous space stations had been transported in traditional rockets.
16:16But this limited their size.
16:18It also was incredibly expensive because the rockets were only good for one flight.
16:24Fortunately, NASA was thinking ahead.
16:26Three, two, one, liftoff.
16:31The space shuttle is envisioned as basically a truck that can move things into space.
16:37It is the mechanism by which something else can happen.
16:40The space shuttle was conceived and approved knowing that someday we would have a space station
16:48and the space shuttle would build that space station.
16:52Designed in the 1970s, the five space shuttles are NASA's Swiss Army Knife space vehicles
16:58ready for any job.
17:01The shuttle had the crew compartment and behind that you had this payload bay,
17:06which the doors kind of opened up.
17:09It was a huge compartment and had all the right dimensions and structural and mechanical interfaces
17:16for launching the space station elements.
17:17The shuttle was also outfitted with a remote arm, a perfect thing to build ISS.
17:27Without that, we could not have done it.
17:29Then it can re-enter and land ready to fly again.
17:34So all these fantastic abilities.
17:36In 1998, after nearly 15 years of planning, the team is ready to launch and then assemble the first two modules in orbit.
17:49It was a bit of a concern, especially early on, would all these things fit together
17:54for the very first time meeting in space.
18:04This was a project on a scale like never before.
18:0715 different countries assembling components across the globe using countless technologies
18:12and speaking almost as many languages.
18:15Even with the measurements, it's tomatoes, tomatoes.
18:18When I think about the International Space Station, in all honesty, the first thing I think about is,
18:25did we use metric units or English units?
18:29The answer is actually both.
18:31For the U.S., it's all in feet and inches.
18:34Of course, the Russian program was all metric.
18:37So, you know, watching your decimal points and your units is very, very important.
18:41The problem is metric and imperial connections aren't compatible.
18:47The engineering solution to joining the modules together is both brilliant and simple.
18:53The common birthing mechanism is a mechanical system that is shared with all of our international
18:59partners so that if we're bringing, say, a European module together with one of the U.S. modules
19:06or a Japanese module, it allows us to mate them together.
19:09On December 4th, 1998, the docking system is put to the test when NASA launches Space Shuttle Endeavour,
19:21carrying the central hub module for the International Space Station named Unity.
19:27The Russian module Zarya, which has a basic life support system and will provide initial guidance,
19:33power and propulsion for the space station, is already orbiting Earth.
19:38Now, the two have to be joined.
19:41But to do that, Unity first has to be moved out of the cargo bay and onto the shuttle's roof.
19:48The arm operator, Nancy Curry, she basically grabbed the Unity module where she positioned the module
19:56right above the orbiter docking system. And then she positioned the arm to capture the free-flying
20:03Zarya, which is a challenge in itself to actually capture a free-flying vehicle with the arm.
20:09Traveling at 17,500 miles per hour, that seems like a bit of an understatement.
20:21But now, slowly and steadily, Nancy uses the arm to catch Zarya.
20:30The time has come to join the two modules, and it's not going to be easy.
20:35Docking mechanisms require kinetic energy to capture using the momentum of two vehicles,
20:42essentially smashing together. But the arm is not good at providing high-speed momentum,
20:50because I guess the way to look at it is when it maneuvers payloads in free space,
20:55it moves those in a very slow and methodical manner. So there is a basic incompatibility between
21:02the two systems. This was a cause of concern for mission control leading up to the mission.
21:08After many, many months of analyzing this particular situation, we came up with something
21:14that's known as SRMS assisted docking. So this is the way it works. This is kind of crazy. Sorry.
21:21It's December 1998, and mission control holds its breath as the first two modules of the
21:33International Space Station inch towards each other in space. This is the way it works. The
21:41commander of the shuttle initiated down-firing control system jets to essentially slam the two
21:48modules together while the arm is still holding on. It's a difficult thing to do because if the two
21:55modules were not aligned properly, you could potentially have a bounce-off, and that would
22:01not be good. It's a tense moment. Commander Bob Cabana has to hit the two modules together hard enough
22:09that the docking mechanism locks. But if the modules aren't perfectly lined up, Zarya could bounce off,
22:15flying out of orbit. Bob Cabana basically pulled some jets and brought the two spacecraft together.
22:26Everything worked just perfectly. We were ecstatic. It was the very first element. We were proud. We were happy.
22:36It takes three seven-hour spacewalks to fully connect the modules. But then they're ready to open the hatch
22:44between Unity and Zarya. On December 13, 1998, Space Shuttle Endeavor uncouples, and the first section of the
22:53Space Station floats free. The fact that they got it up there and they fit together as they're supposed to
23:01is a wonder. So that was the first stack of Space Station. It was an amazing feeling
23:07to actually see the two systems working together on orbit. We were on the phone with our Russian
23:14colleagues and we were all celebrating. Over the next two years, a third module with advanced life
23:23support systems to create water and oxygen arrives. And in October 2000, astronaut Bill Shepard and
23:31cosmonauts Yuri Gizinko and Sergei Krikalev check in. The first long-term residents at the International Space Station.
23:47The early years are where mostly construction, a lot of spacewalks took place, do the external connections
23:54on the cables and everything else, and make space station ready. One of the first jobs is to fit two
24:01solar arrays that arrive in December. The size of a Boeing 777 wing and covered with over 262,000 solar
24:11cells. The solar arrays are the largest electrical power system ever put in space. While on the ground,
24:19a team of specialists focuses on keeping the crew alive. At first, maintaining the life support
24:26equipment was challenging. Most of the equipment that we have on the space station had never been flown
24:31in a space-like environment. So it was all brand new equipment being used for the first time.
24:38Ensuring there's enough air is job number one. If you just use stored gas, you would go through it
24:44in a matter of days. So you have to have a more sustainable source of oxygen, and we do that with water.
24:53500 gallons of water can be stored on board, taking up much less room than pure oxygen would.
25:00So to make oxygen, we add electricity to it through a process called electrolysis. We split the hydrogen
25:07from the oxygen in the water. So the water then turns into breathing oxygen for the crew. So you
25:15could ask, where does the water come from? The answer to that is why you can't be squeamish
25:21and be an astronaut. So the water is initially brought to the space station in storage tanks,
25:27and the crew drinks it. We collect their urine, distill it, process it through specialized filters,
25:34then turning that back into drinkable water that is better than the water that you can find in your
25:41tap at home. And the recycling doesn't stop there. We even have the crew, after they're done exercising,
25:49wipe off their sweat with towels and hang up the towels and dry off the towels, and we collect that
25:55as well. So we want every little bit of drop of water. The life support technologies that they are
26:01developing on the ISS will allow us to go back and live on the moon, travel to Mars,
26:07and perhaps one day even leave the solar system. Two years later, NASA's destiny laboratory is added.
26:17It's the first of six research modules where the astronauts will conduct scientific experiments
26:23that are impossible to do on Earth. It brings the space station to about a third of its final size.
26:32Also in space, carrying out their own experiments is the crew of the space shuttle Columbia.
26:37One, we have booster ignition and liftoff of space shuttle Columbia.
26:42When on February 1st, 2003, disaster strikes.
26:47They were about maybe 15, 20 minutes from landing, and they stopped answering the radio calls
26:57from Houston. And I started, there's something not normal here.
27:03Fado, do you have any tracking?
27:05No, sir.
27:11So I started changing channels on my television, and I got to a major news station,
27:16and it showed this burning debris across the sky in Texas.
27:23And I immediately knew that the crew could not survive that.
27:28Returning from a 16-day flight, Columbia explodes on reentry.
27:35And it was like the worst day of my life.
27:44Following the Columbia disaster, all space shuttles are grounded.
27:47No modules are going anywhere until they figure out exactly what went wrong
27:51and how to make sure it can never happen again.
27:56Analysis of the accident reveals the cause of the disaster actually happens during takeoff.
28:01A piece of foam fell off of the external tank about the size of a briefcase.
28:08It impacted the port side underside of the wing.
28:12It basically punched a hole in the wing.
28:16Although the falling foam is spotted on takeoff, the damage to the wing isn't.
28:21And two weeks later, the shuttle was given the go-ahead to return to Earth.
28:26And then while the shuttle was reentering, due to the damage, the heat flux went in
28:33and basically melted the structure, right? And that's how Columbia disintegrated.
28:44Commander Eileen Collins is scheduled to fly to the space station on the shuttle Discovery,
28:49a month after the Columbia disaster. Her flight is delayed two years and takes on new meaning.
28:57It became what was now called the return to flight mission.
29:01Test techniques to make the shuttle safer again.
29:05Including testing the heat shield tiles.
29:08We did a lot of experiments in vacuum chambers.
29:11We had to simulate re-entry tests, right, in our jets.
29:17The team also develops a shuttle repair technique, which on Earth would be simple.
29:23But to work in space, they need materials that don't exist yet.
29:28Our crew was very actively involved in that.
29:31And we had some material called the goo and a little gun that was the goo deployment gun.
29:36And practiced fixing these pieces of broken tile.
29:40It's like a caulking gun you use on your bathroom tiles, let's say, right?
29:45It took a good amount of time, about a year and a half, two years to develop that material.
29:53In July of 2005, Eileen and the Discovery crew are ready for takeoff.
29:59But during launch,
30:06the unthinkable happens.
30:08A very large piece of foam fell off the other side of the tank from where the Columbia foam was.
30:13And boom, that piece of foam fell off the pail ramp and went right underneath our right wing.
30:24It's 2005.
30:25And during launch on a mission to the International Space Station,
30:28insulating foam falls off of the space shuttle Discovery.
30:32The same thing that caused the Columbia disaster.
30:35To see if it's damaged the shuttle, Commander Eileen Collins carries out a daring maneuver.
30:41Say this is the space station.
30:43Now, normally the shuttle will come up from below, stop at 600 feet, pause, but then start a maneuver.
30:51And very, very slowly, I think it was about one degree per second, flip the shuttle around to expose the bottom of the shuttle,
31:00which is the tiles, as well as the leading edge of the wing, to the astronauts on board the space station.
31:06Alpha Discovery, start photo.
31:08Photos, Sergei.
31:09Executing this maneuver so close to the International Space Station requires incredible precision
31:16and perfect timing.
31:17The astronauts inside the space station could actually look out their window and take photographs
31:24of the underside of the space shuttle, so to really analyze all parts of the space shuttle using imagery.
31:31Thankfully, the heat shield hasn't been damaged.
31:35And this extraordinary backflip in space becomes standard for all future space shuttle missions.
31:41The RPM maneuver that was developed in the space shuttle program could have very likely saved the lives of astronauts and future missions.
31:51We have booster ignition and liftoff of the space shuttle endeavor.
31:57But the challenges are far from over, because the team has to constantly reconfigure the space station as different pieces are added.
32:05In 2007, astronaut Scott Parzinski is preparing a new docking system.
32:19The most challenging part of the mission was to relocate a large solar array truss with a catchy name P-6.
32:28At the time of our arrival, this P-6 truss was on the very top of the space station.
32:32It was the very first solar panel set that had been delivered to the ISS.
32:38And so it had been in space for many, many years at this point.
32:41So when we talk about solar arrays, they're basically the same as solar panels that you might have on the roof of your house.
32:48But for space, they have to be a lot lighter weight and a lot higher performance.
32:53They're also huge.
32:55The 82 panels, each the size of a Boeing 777 wing, were folded into boxes to get them into space.
33:02So when it deployed out, it kind of all unfolded out like an accordion with using guide wires to guide that deployment out.
33:10Now the old solar array needs to be folded back up, moved, and then deployed again.
33:17Solar array deploys starting on my mark.
33:21Spoiler alert, it doesn't go per plan.
33:23Three, two, one, mark.
33:27We were about maybe 80, 85 percent out when one of the cables snagged and it tore that joint.
33:38We saw five tears and they were very long tears and we got worried.
33:45And the concern was that even if we were to undock at that point, it could rip apart.
33:49It could damage the space station or the space shuttle.
33:53Damage to the station could be catastrophic.
33:57For three days, engineers in mission control and the astronauts in space work on a solution.
34:03It wasn't like we could go to a local hardware store and get a solar array repair kit.
34:08You know, we had to build it with the things that we had with us on the shuttle space station complex.
34:14We create a coupling type of design where we have this long wire, you know, flat piece at each end
34:23and just somehow try to put those through those holes and maybe that could work.
34:31On November 3rd, the robotic arm is used to move Parzynski to the end of the broken solar panel.
34:37Repairing it will be a very dangerous operation.
34:41It was a fully energized solar panel. We couldn't turn it off.
34:44So I had to be very careful not to have any direct contact.
34:48On Earth, air acts as an insulator, preventing electricity from jumping easily between objects.
34:56But in space, with no air to slow it down, electric arcs can jump further, burn hotter and last longer.
35:05Any activity you do could cause motion and you need to be ready to lean back away from it.
35:10But I'm ready.
35:12Electricity could arc into my space suit full of 100% oxygen and there could be a fire or an explosion,
35:19which to me sounded like a really bad thing.
35:21Scott Parzynski, brave guy.
35:24We had to essentially stitch it back together.
35:27And that was a beautiful thing, though, to see that cufflink go into the hole.
35:32Yes, it was.
35:33So we're doing surgery out at the end of the space station.
35:36We're going to apply a little force, get it fully engaged there.
35:40For seven hours, all Mission Control can do is watch and wait.
35:45One by one, just install these cufflinks.
35:51Just a beautiful job.
35:53That's how you do it. Looks good.
35:56And then he waved.
35:57And we were all sitting there those three days. I don't think we slept.
36:03It's the moment of truth as the solar array finishes unfolding.
36:08We've got deployed to streets. Two deployed to streets.
36:11Yay!
36:12All right. Beautiful.
36:13Great news. What an accomplishment.
36:16Nice teamwork. Phenomenal.
36:19It was really quite an exciting day on the job.
36:24While P-6 has been a success, by 2007, the solar array has been in space for seven years.
36:32So NASA decides it's time for an upgrade.
36:35The new system is called ROSA.
36:38ROSA stands for the Rollout Solar Array.
36:40It's a product we've been developing for over a decade or so.
36:44And it's different than most solar array technologies that are flying in space,
36:48in that it actually rolls out kind of like a carpet rolling out, if you will.
36:53It makes things a lot simpler than the older accordion style. There's a lot less moving parts going on.
36:57Each mat is covered in thousands of individual solar cells.
37:03Compared to the original ISS solar arrays, the PV technology is anywhere from two to three times more efficient.
37:10After more than a decade in development, the first ROSAs are ready.
37:16It was an exciting day.
37:18This was a big milestone achievement for ROSA and us as a company.
37:24So a little bit of nerves.
37:27Once the astronauts released a special bolt that let the wings go,
37:32the rollout solar array just rolled right out just like it was supposed to.
37:36It's another space station first that could mean big things for our future in space.
37:43We're putting ROSAs on geocommunication satellites.
37:48We're looking at using ROSA on the lunar surface.
37:51So there's really endless possibilities of where we could use this ROSA technology in space.
37:56By 2009, the space station is almost complete.
38:0613 of the 15 modules have been attached, but what it's missing is a room with a view.
38:13Seeing your home planet from space is a life-changing experience.
38:17You're traveling at 17,500 miles an hour and you're seeing a sunrise or sunset every 45 minutes.
38:24You're seeing the world without boundaries.
38:26And it was just a dreamlike experience.
38:30And liftoff of Shuttle Endeavor.
38:33So in February 2010, a 180-degree window called the Cupola is taken to the space station
38:40on Space Shuttle Endeavor.
38:41With NASA's final space station crew compartment, it brings a bay window view for our celestial backyard.
38:47As well as protective doors made from the whipple shield, the glass is made of four layers.
38:56An outer layer of few silica to protect from impact.
38:59Then two layers that withhold pressure.
39:01In the event of a failure of the primary pressure pain, that second pain, we call the redundant pain,
39:08is capable of carrying that load holding the pressure.
39:13And finally, an inner scratch pain to protect it from the astronauts.
39:17The crew are going to be looking out the windows.
39:19They'll put their camera lenses on these.
39:21It's an instant hit.
39:22Just the imagery coming through there and the fact that they spend all their time, their free time
39:31in that location tells me a lot about how endeared they are to this piece of hardware.
39:41The view from low earth orbit is absolutely gorgeous.
39:47It's really not even just what you see, it's how it makes you feel.
39:51Put your face up against the window and stretch out your arms and you're floating.
39:58You just cannot put a price on it.
40:00It is just one of the most magical things that you can do in space.
40:12In May 2011, Space Shuttle Endeavour delivers the final module to the International Space Station.
40:18I would like to think that the International Space Station, in the words of many of the astronauts
40:24who I've spoken with who have been there, has become a model for international collaboration
40:29in really unique and difficult circumstances.
40:32It is amazing to think that for over two decades, the International Space Station has circled
40:45our planet, pushing the boundaries of science and engineering, as well as being a place that
40:50over 280 astronauts from all over the world have called home.
40:54What ISS is doing, that is for everyone on this globe.
41:04And there are very few things you can talk about that will do that.
41:10Over 3,000 experiments have taken place on the space station, some that will bring about huge change
41:17back down here on Earth.
41:19That's the ultimate goal of putting people in space.
41:21It's not just to be there and to observe Earth or to observe space.
41:26It's really about being able to develop new things that could be useful back on Earth.
41:31A lot of our water filtration technology is being utilized in third world countries,
41:37taking water supplies that are really undrinkable and using our technology in such
41:43a way that we can provide drinking pure water.
41:47We also have a biofabrication facility where we're doing things like 3D printing human tissue
41:54that is not possible on Earth with gravity. So it's possible in the future that we could be
41:59doing things like printing full organs, transporting them back where people can use them here on Earth.
42:08In 2030, 46 years after President Reagan announced his vision,
42:13the International Space Station will come to the end of its life.
42:18Spacecraft have a limited life. You can't keep it up there indefinitely.
42:22The space environment's very harsh on these big structures.
42:27That's what's kind of side of motion, but a lot of the experience and capabilities
42:32that we've learned from the space station, I mean, those are invaluable.
42:38Despite its imminent end, the International Space Station will live on in the space stations that follow.
42:44There are companies that are now planning to build separate space stations where companies,
42:53maybe tourists, could go live in and spend time in space. And so I think that's really exciting.
42:58Using the technology developed through the space station, in the next few years,
43:04NASA's Artemis missions will be putting a permanent human presence on the moon, and maybe beyond.
43:11I see the ISS is at the foundation of all the really audacious things that are in store for us in the future.
43:19As human beings, we tend to be explorers. We tend to want to know what's across the next hill,
43:27what's in the next horizon. And the space station was
43:30that major stepping stone for maybe exploring our solar system.
43:37After several millennia in pursuit of the most ingenious, awe-inspiring structures on Earth,
43:42we're now sending them into orbit, 250 miles above our heads, circling our planet.
43:49Where will we try to put up a building next? Who knows?
43:52Although, I hear there's plenty of cool real estate on Mars.
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