2018 marks the 20th anniversary of the start of construction of the International Space Station. The first segment of it was launched in December 1998 to a target point in an orbit about 250 miles above the earth. Arriving a few days after launch, that first section—a self-propelled spacecraft module—set the scene for a 12-year construction program that saw the assembly of 33 more major pieces delivered mostly by the space shuttle. Building sites often have accidents, but there were no mishaps plugging the station together in space. It was an astonishing success story given the multitude of hazards involved.
Berthed, bolted, and wired together, the 34 pieces have metamorphosed into a genuine extraterrestrial human settlement. Succeeding Mir, the Russian space station that orbited the earth from 1986 to 2001, the International Space Station has accommodated during its first two decades a community of 230 astronauts, cosmonauts, and deep-pocketed space tourists. By comparison, around 100 explorers established the Jamestown colony in Virginia in 1607.
Whether arriving by square-rigged ship or spacecraft, settlers bring with them few creature comforts, as stowage room is limited and the essentials matter most. In the station, crews are sealed inside a cluster of pressurized cylindrical modules stuffed with vital hardware and consumables. The architecture is austere, so much so that former astronaut Chris Hadfield likened the module interiors to hospital corridors. (Early designs from the 1980s that attempted to enliven and enrich the interiors were ultimately overruled by engineering priorities.) Banks of racks full of equipment and experiments line the curved walls of the modules, leaving narrow corridors down the center for crew access and movement. Familiar floor, wall, and ceiling surfaces dissolve to become rows of confining rack faces. These are often cluttered with switches, sockets, cables, monitors, laptops, checklists, and other paraphernalia that protrude into the corridors, giving them a shambolic appearance.