This weekend, NASA will be adding an extra room the side of the International Space Station. Starting at 2:15AM ET on Saturday, the space agency will begin installation of the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, or the BEAM — an inflatable space habitat that will stay connected to the Tranquility node of the ISS for the next two years. Once the BEAM is connected to the station and inflated, it will provide 565 cubic feet of room for astronauts to move around.
An inflatable space habitat is getting attached to the ISS this weekend
NASA
Installation of the BEAM is expected to take about four hours
The BEAM was just delivered to the ISS on the most recent SpaceX launch. The main goal of the module is to test out how expandable habitat technologies hold up in the space environment. That information will help the BEAM's manufacturer, Bigelow Aersopace, build even more robust expandable space habitats in the future. Eventually Bigelow wants to build space hotels that scientists and even tourists could visit in the future. Yesterday, the company announced that it hopes to use rockets from the United Launch Alliance to launch its expandable habitats sometime in 2020. CEO Robert Bigelow hopes to attach one of those bigger modules to the ISS, similar to what the company did with the BEAM. Bigelow wants NASA astronauts would utilize the space, as well as private customers and even visiting vacationers. "Our hope is that NASA would be the primary customer for that structure and we'd be given permission [to commercialize it]," said Bigelow. "Essentially we'd be timesharing."
Installation of the BEAM is expected to take about four hours, but NASA will only air a portion of that process. The space agency says live coverage of the event will start at 5:30AM ET on Saturday, and then things are expected to wrap up around 6:15AM ET. However, the module will stay deflated until the end of May. At that point, it will expand out to its maximum size of 13 feet long and 10 feet in diameter.
The main draw of inflatable space habitats is that they’re flexible: remaining compact during launch and then expanding outward when in space. But it’s unclear how the habitats will fare during long stays in microgravity, which is why the BEAM holds a suite of sensors that will gather data about the habitat’s time at the station. Astronauts on board the ISS will then enter the BEAM about three to four times a year to collect this info for NASA and Bigelow. Once the BEAM’s time at the ISS is over, it will be detached from the station and then eventually burn up in Earth’s atmosphere.
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