I hope he finds his time worth the price tag. I'd rather go on a cruise.

Is it too much to hope for that they might keep him up there?

Is it too much to hope for that they might keep him up there?

#2 | Posted by Shawn at 2008-10-05 05:41 PM | Reply | Flag:

I don't think doing so will make Tabula Rasa suck any less.

Whoever wrote that article has no clue what they are talking about. The ISS regularly boosts its orbit, not to prepare for visitors, but to keep it from falling back into the atmosphere. Due to friction, the ISS loses about 1 kilometer per week in altitude. It relies on boosts from the rockets on attached cargo ships or visiting manned ships to raise the orbit.

Boosting the ISS actually makes it slightly harder for the Soyuz rocket to rendezvous with the ISS, but the change in altitude is trivial compared to getting into orbit in the first place.

The ISS may have done the maneuver so that it can then un-dock a cargo ship that it used to do the boost. Or, it did the boost now because they are more effective without a visiting ship connected (less mass). Or they may simply be re-orienting the ISS in relation to its orbit, so that it faces a more favorable direction. This does not involve a change in altitude, and is a trivial operation, along the lines of "White House opens gate to accept visitors".

are you fucking kidding me

For what it's worth, while he's up there, he plans to launch a capsule of DNA from people who play Tabula Rasa, so that one day they might help to repopulate the human race and solidify our main food sources of Doritos and Mountain Dew.