How Nasa plans to destroy the International Space Station

The US space agency faces a series of challenges to decommission the ISS without endangering lives on Earth

International Space Station (ISS) orbits above Earth
The first segment of the International Space Station (ISS) was launched into space in 1998
(Image credit: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Heather Muir, a PhD candidate in computational physics at Cambridge University, on the many risks involved in getting the station from orbit to the Pacific Ocean’s Point Nemo ‘spacecraft graveyard’

Nasa has announced plans for the International Space Station (ISS) to be officially decommissioned in 2031. After dozens of launches since 1998 got the station up and into orbit, bringing it down will be a feat of its own – the risks are serious if things go wrong.

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