20 Years in Space
2020 marks the twentieth anniversary of humans continuously occupying the International Space Station ISS.
Starting with two Russian and one American astronaut in 2000 there has always been someone living and working at the station in low-Earth orbit. According to the National Geographic, this at the same time means that for the past twenty years there has not been one moment that every single human being was on earth.
Kenny Todd, NASA’s deputy program manager for the ISS told the National Geographic, “There’s kids now who are in college who, for their entire lives, we’ve been living off the planet. When I was a kid, that was all stuff that was just dreams.”
Over the two decades, 241 women and men have called the 150 billion $ station their home. Several astronauts have spent more than a year on the ISS – 254 miles off the earth’s surface. The space station is a joint project of 15 countries and was started by the US in 1984 as “Space Station Freedom”.
Over a 100 thousand people contributed to its design and construction. David Nixon, who worked with NASA on ISS designs told the National Geographic, “When you compare the station to the procession of great structures and buildings built by humanity since the dawn of civilization, it’s up there with the Pyramids, the Acropolis—all the great structures and edifices.”