Year Long Expeditions To ISS

[mhellesen]

I was just reading through some old James Oberg articles on MSNBC and I stumbled across one referencing Russia's desire to have a year long expedition mission.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4779952/

At the time NASA decided it wasn't in their best interest but said it was a possibility for future increments once more 6 month base-line data had been gathered. 

It's been 5 years since that discussion.  Has anything more ever come out of this?  We will ever see 1 year missions to the ISS for the crews?  Like the article says at some point we are going to have to get used to the idea of longer missions.

Thanks

Mike

[Ben the Space Brit]

Let's put it this way: There is no technical reason why this is not possible.  Cosmonauts stayed on Salut 7 and on Mir for more than a calendar year.  There are a few issues that would have to be ironed out first:

1) Return capability - The Soyuz has an in-space lifespan of about six months, so a ~12 month mission would require at least one change over of return vehicle in this time; not impossible or impractical but something to think about;

2) Health monitoring - Although the ISS has as good a crew maintenance set up as any long-term space facility, any year-long expedition would need very close monitoring of health to prevent problems (muscle wastage or bone decalcification) sneaking up on the crew;

3) Reason - There would need to be a good reason.  A ~1-year mission would be a useful research prerequisite for planning a Mars program - can we keep the crew functional this long, then have them functional quickly after re-entry and return to a gravity well? If not, then we need some kind of gravity simulation on the outbound flight.  However, not having that reason, the problems, both unavoidable and potential, would make NASA and its international partners somewhat reluctant to take the risk.

Overall, I can't see anyone being willing to do this at this time.  It doesn't have the "In Your Face! Wow!" of a lunar landing or NEO encounter.  Day 365 on the ISS looks much like Day 1, unfortuanately, even though the actual gains in biomedical knowledge and benefit to spaceflight theory would be significant.

[Hungry4info3]

Overall, I can't see anyone being willing to do this at this time.

Heck I'd do it     Even knowing the health risks.

Perhaps some other astronauts would too.

[JimO]

I asked Mike Barrett about this before he launched -- he dismissed the entire idea as useless and uninteresting.

But from the Russian point of view it has a number of uses:

1. It puts them ahead of the US in duration of space missions, again -- showing the Mir missions weren't flukes. It allows calibration against the long-duration isolation runs planned for 2010-11 at the IMBP in Moscow.

2. It opens a seat on an intermediate Soyuz crew swap mission, for a short-term rental -- at a cool $35 million or so, that's an awfully LOT of good reasons.

 

[aquarius]

Do the Russians need a permission from NASA to undertake such an expedition?

[erioladastra]

Do the Russians need a permission from NASA to undertake such an expedition?

Yes.  They could negotiate if they really wanted.  It would impact training and currency.  Medically it isn't that critical right now.  The biggest issue though is 5 years ago no one wanted to do it (by the time you factor in all the training etc it is a loooooong time away from people you know).  Now there might be some but I don't think it is very popular of an idea.

[rybo]

As mentioned before, there would need to be a good reason for a year long mission. You have to remember, an astronaut costs a lot of money to train etc, so it is prudent to keep them in the best possible health. A year long mission presents some considerable health challenges.

[simon-th]

Do the Russians need a permission from NASA to undertake such an expedition?

Yes.  They could negotiate if they really wanted.  It would impact training and currency.  Medically it isn't that critical right now.  The biggest issue though is 5 years ago no one wanted to do it (by the time you factor in all the training etc it is a loooooong time away from people you know).  Now there might be some but I don't think it is very popular of an idea.

I didn't know that 6-month rotations of the Russian crewmembers are contractually set in the IGA or any MOUs. Do you know where Russia committed to 6-months rotations of their crew members?

[erioladastra]

Do the Russians need a permission from NASA to undertake such an expedition?

Yes.  They could negotiate if they really wanted.  It would impact training and currency.  Medically it isn't that critical right now.  The biggest issue though is 5 years ago no one wanted to do it (by the time you factor in all the training etc it is a loooooong time away from people you know).  Now there might be some but I don't think it is very popular of an idea.

I didn't know that 6-month rotations of the Russian crewmembers are contractually set in the IGA or any MOUs. Do you know where Russia committed to 6-months rotations of their crew members?

In the original agreements it was agreed to be 6 months.  In the recent update on 6 cre ops it was spelled out very explicitly.

[cgrunska]

well if 1 year terms look so bad for health reasons, why are we wanting to send people to mars? isn't transit time and microgravity on mars/moon starting to scare the scientists at nasa?

[erioladastra]

well if 1 year terms look so bad for health reasons, why are we wanting to send people to mars? isn't transit time and microgravity on mars/moon starting to scare the scientists at nasa?

I don't think anyone made such a claim.

[Suzy]

Might be happening in the next few years.

[Fuji]

Might be happening in the next few years.

This topic is discussed here.  and L2
 -Flight crew assignments
 http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=740.2085

[QuantumG]

Public links can be copied from L2.

http://english.ruvr.ru/2012_08_22/Russia-US-to-free-spacecraft-seats-for-tourists-in-2015/

I see that's already on the public thread, and answers the question.

[manboy]

As mentioned before, there would need to be a good reason for a year long mission. You have to remember, an astronaut costs a lot of money to train etc, so it is prudent to keep them in the best possible health. A year long mission presents some considerable health challenges.

But those health challenges are something that needs to be overcome.

Public links can be copied from L2.

http://english.ruvr.ru/2012_08_22/Russia-US-to-free-spacecraft-seats-for-tourists-in-2015/

I see that's already on the public thread, and answers the question.

I'd like to hear what erioladastra has to say about this before I get excited

[wjbarnett]

JimO has an in-depth article on the topic: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48807002/ns/technology_and_science-space

[WellingtonEast]

FYI - they also have this link for Centrifuge which I am surprised has not been a priority for the ISS todate for medical data collection.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37120546/ns/technology_and_science-space/t/artificial-gravity-could-solve-space-problems/

[Robotbeat]

If true, very, very exciting. If you can do a 30-35 month stint at ISS without problems, going to Mars for a long-duration (i.e. years-long) surface trip should (especially if to low-altitude sites, which are coincidentally easier for designing EDL systems) give you fewer problems with microgravity and radiation, while also having the lowest delta-v requirements. Even a 13-15 month mission would demonstrate enough for a short-stay mission (especially appropriate if doing an orbital-only mission), at the cost of much higher delta-v and a possible swingby of Venus (which would be kind of neat, anyway... could be co-timed with a brief low-latency teleprescence robotic mission to the surface of Venus, controlled for a day or so by the crew in transit to Mars).

Yearlong stays would also greatly increase the possible NEA targets, allowing lower mission delta-v.

[Archibald]

Indeed, that's important. And logical. It is the kind of mission the ISS could be useful for, particularly in the view of public opinion. Somewhat it would make the ISS more useful than the meagre science performed there...

Imagine the layman on the street. On TV he heards there had been a 520 day simulation of a Mars trip. He also vaguely knows we have a large, expensive space station in earth orbit.

Yet the 520 day simulation happened on the ground. Go figure. That doesn't sounds logical at all...

Hell, it is the kind of mission von Braun would have approved. In his infamous collier series, the rotating space station had that very function - a training ground for future long duration missions. It is a concept that reach back to the dawn of the space age.

[erioladastra]

As mentioned before, there would need to be a good reason for a year long mission. You have to remember, an astronaut costs a lot of money to train etc, so it is prudent to keep them in the best possible health. A year long mission presents some considerable health challenges.

But those health challenges are something that needs to be overcome.

Public links can be copied from L2.

http://english.ruvr.ru/2012_08_22/Russia-US-to-free-spacecraft-seats-for-tourists-in-2015/

I see that's already on the public thread, and answers the question.

I'd like to hear what erioladastra has to say about this before I get excited

Well I have not heard of it being seriously discussed but will have to poke around.  I know a big issue is that the flight docs don't yet feel we could get enough out of it and 1-2 data points doesn't help.