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TECHNOLOGY A23
Tuesday 3 November 2015
Space station marks 15 years of nonstop human presence
MARCIA DUNN sion with Russian Mikhail In this frame grab from NASA Television, astronaut Kjell Lindgren performs maintenance outside
AP Aerospace Writer Kornienko, due to end in the International Space Station, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2015. Lindgren and fellow astronaut Scott
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. March, includes 400 experi- Kelly’s to-do list included greasing the station’s big robot arm, routing cables, removing insulation
(AP) — Humankind marked ments, many of them med- from an electronic switching unit and covering an antimatter and dark matter detector.
an off-the-planet pinnacle ical. Americans have never
Monday: the 15th anni- spent this long in space; Associated Press
versary of continuous resi- the Russians have, but it
dency at the International was decades ago on the national Space Station’ re- anese astronaut Kimiya Yui members respecting each
Space Station. former Mir station. ally represents what it is. So said the space station has other. If this were practiced
NASA and its global part- NASA puts the number of in some ways, maybe it’s a yielded a unique culture back on the planet, he
ners celebrated the mile- experiments at this space better name.” given all the nationalities noted, “the Earth will be a
stone, as did the six astro- station, over the years, at As for day-to-day life, Jap- involved, with the crew much better place.”q
nauts on board. The U.S., more than 1,760. At the
Russian and Japanese same time, there have U.S. to add automatic braking
spacemen planned a spe- been 189 spacewalks to to 5-star car safety rating
cial dinner 250 miles up. build and maintain the
Commander Scott Kelly, outpost since construction JOAN LOWY said automatic braking warn of an imminent colli-
seven months into a year- began in 1998; No. 190 will Associated Press will be added to the rat- sion and, if the driver does
long mission, said the big- occur Friday when Kelly WASHINGTON (AP) — The ings beginning with 2018 not apply the brakes, en-
gest benefit of the orbiting and Lindgren venture out U.S. government is adding model cars. The agency gage the brakes automati-
lab is furthering long-term for the second time in 1½ automatic braking to its announced in September cally. Accident investiga-
exploration goals deeper weeks. five-star safety rating sys- that it had reached vol- tors estimate automatic
into space. As the space station ages, tem designed to help con- untary agreements with braking could prevent or
“The space station really is more maintenance will be sumers identify the most 10 automakers to include mitigate an estimated 80
a bridge. It’s a test bed for required. NASA hopes to important safety technolo- the technology as stan- percent of rear-end col-
the technologies that we keep the complex running gies to look for in new cars. dard in new cars, but of- lisions that cause about
need to develop and un- until 2024. The National Highway Traf- fered no timeline. 1,700 deaths and a half-
derstand in order to have NASA Administrator Charles fic Safety Administration The systems use sensors to million injuries annually.q
a successful trip to Mars,” Bolden called Monday’s
American astronaut Kjell milestone “a remarkable
Lindgren noted during a moment 5,478 days in the
news conference. making.”
Since the first permanent “It has taught us about
crew moved in on Nov. what’s possible when tens
2, 2000, 220 people have of thousands of people
come and gone, repre- across 15 countries collab-
senting 17 countries. orate to advance shared
The United States is in the goals,” Bolden said in a
lead because of all the statement.
space shuttle flights that One sticking point, one to
were needed to deliver two decades ago, was a
station pieces; Russia is in name for the place other
second place, and Cana- than International Space
da and Japan tied for third. Station — ISS in NASA short-
At least one American and hand.
one Russian have been on The original inhabitants —
board at all times. American Bill Shepherd and
More than 26,500 meals Russians Sergei Krikalev and
have been dished up, ac- Yuri Gidzenko — christened
cording to NASA, and the their high-flying home Al-
complex has grown from pha when they arrived, but
three to 13 rooms since the name didn’t last. Kelly
2000. The current structure remembers wishing back
has a mass of nearly 1 mil- then that the space station
lion pounds and as much had a real name, but the
pressurized volume as a various countries couldn’t
Boeing 747. agree on one.
The most important experi- “Now, it’s the ‘space sta-
ment, Kelly said, is about tion’ to me and I think it’s
keeping humans alive in a great name,” Kelly told
space. His one-year mis- reporters. “The name ‘Inter-
