REAL LIFE NEWS: INFLATABLE HABITAT HEADING FOR SPACE
by Hazed
An inflatable module is being sent to the International Space Station for testing, and assuming all went well it should have blasted off on Friday or Saturday.
It’s a Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) produced by a company that thinks inflatable modules could be a cheaper and more flexible solution to providing space habitats. In the past they have talked about space hotels, but currently they are working with NASA to see whether their modules can be used to provide habitats for missions to the Moon, Mars or even beyond.
In its compacted state, the BEAM is 2.16 metres long, 2.36 meters in diameter and has a volume of just 3.6 metres cubed. When it’s attached to the ISS’s Tranquillity node, it will be pumped up to its full size, 4.01 metres in length, 3.23 metres in diameter and a volume of 16 metres cubed – which would provide a very spacious habitat for astronauts used to the cramped conditions of the station.
However, the BEAM isn’t going to be used for human occupation, or for storage; this trial is a test of its integrity so it will be “constantly monitored for temperature, pressure, and radiation, and ISS crew periodically (four times per year) enter the module to collect data and check on its structural condition”. The trial will last two years.
Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/04/06/bigelow_beam_iss/
