the International Space Station
Columbus’s bumpers
Secured to the front of the International Space Station (ISS)*, in its orbiting direction, the European laboratory is positioned where shocks from meteorites and space objects are the most violent. But Columbus is well prepared…
Quick and tough!
It’s often said there’s strength in numbers. This is especially true about Columbus. The Laboratory brings together the know-how of 41 companies – led by EADS Astrium, with also Alenia and medium-sized companies – representing 14 European countries. This capsule, in which the Germans have played a crucial role by providing over 40% of the finance, is going to have to face some extremely tough conditions. It is in fact going to take up position at the front of the International Space Station, where the blows from micrometeorites are the hardest. In space, where things are not subject to the resistance of the atmosphere, these objects are going to be crashing into the laboratory at 15 km per second. At that speed, even the smallest bits of debris, just a few centimetres large, have the potential to wreak enormous destruction. That’s why it needs to be built like a tank!
Super armour!
With a total weight on the go of 19 tons, Columbus has 2 tons of thick covering making up the shell that protects it. This shield, the MDPS (Meteorid and Debris Protection System), was built by EADS Astrium* at its Saint-Médard-en-Jalles factory, near Bordeaux. It is made up of 81 panels of two different types. There are plain panels, placed on the “back” side of the module and on the interior cone, the least exposed parts, where the Station’s docking system is located; these are aluminium, 1.6 mm thick plates. On the more exposed parts there are double panels have been designed, made up of 2.5 mm sheets of aluminium and a sheet itself made up of 18 different layers of Kevlar reinforced with resin epoxy and covered with four layers of Nextel, an ultra-tough alloy derived from aluminium.
Safety valves
But that’s not all. Because the Columbus module is of course pressurised. Any “leak” would be absolutely catastrophic. So it’s not sufficient just to protect against impacts, but also against the energy produced by these impacts. So the engineers have left a few centimetres empty between the armour and the module’s shell. Together with the centimetres that separate the armour sheets, this space also helps dissipate the energy of crashes, to fully protect the laboratory. Which can then charge forward with head lowered, carrying within its guts the 500 annual experiments that European scientists have to carry out there.
