Rappeling from ISS.?

Question

Why not its possible to rapple down slowly, with a rope mounatineers use ,from ISS up to 10 Kms from the surface of the Earth and then gently jump like a Paratrooper ? Hey , NASA people, Sunita , are you listening me ?

Answer 1

Because the rope you would need to rappel down from the ISS would weigh thousands of tons.

Keep in mind that this rope would not only need to hold YOU up, it would also need to hold up the weight of all of the rope below it. The thinnest part of the rope could be the bottom, wherever you decide you want to jump from. But the top - it would be the thickest. It would have to hold the weight of 200 miles of rope below it (give or take). And that's a lot of rope.

Tack on to that the fact that the ISS is not in a geosynchronous orbit. So the person rappeling downward would actually have friction with the atmosphere at a very high velocity. This would hurt, and probably cause combustion if oxygen were present. If nothing else, the person would bake.

Finally, it's cold in space. Like, 233 below zero celcius cold. So, the rope would have to be able to maintain structural integrity despite the fact that it was frozen stiff.

Answer 2

Because everything on ISS is weightless, so the rope won't hang down and you won't go down when you loosen your grip on it. You and the rope will just float next the space station.

OK, so you find a way to make the rope hang down. Maybe you pull it down with a small rocket. Then you climb down. The ISS is orbiting at 17,500 MPH, so the lower end of the robe would be tearing through the air at 17,500 MPH. That seems like a problem, don't you think? The friction would burn you and the rope up. But in reality, tidal forces would cause the robe to not want to hang down; it would want to hang sideways, not down. The reasons are a little hard to describe but it has to do with the fact the orbital speed below the ISS is a little higher than 17,500 MPH, and the lower you go the higher the speed needed to stay in orbit.

Anyway, the main problem is that ISS is zooming around at 17,500 MPH all the time, not just sitting there.

Now, at a higher altitude, not a mere 300 miles up like ISS but 25,000 miles up where the TV satellites are, the orbital speed is slower such that it just keeps up with Earth's rotation. The satellite is going thousands of miles per hour, but that is just enough to make it stay above the same place on the ground all the time. If that case, if you could lower a really strong, long rope, you COULD climb down it. And up it too. That idea has actually been proposed. It is called the space elevator. NASA and others are actually doing some work on that. The main problem is finding a strong enough material to make the rope.

Answer 3

Because ISS is not in a geosynchronous orbit. It travels around earth at around 17,500 MPH, and so would be anyone rappelling down a rope from it. Once they got into the upper atmosphere, they would first be severely buffeted about, and then if they rappelled any farther down, burned to a crisp by atmospheric friction.
Such a stunt WOULD be possible from geosynchronous orbit, but you'd have MUCH farther to rappel. I doubt you could carry sufficient oxygen for the trip.

Answer 4

Because no material on the face of the Earth would be strong enough to hold under it's own weight that high up. The decent down, at a resonable pace, would take days/months. Also, unprotected astronauts would be plastered by meteors. However, along similar lines, NASA is currently developing a space elevator, however, again, we're still in the process of developing materials that are strong enough to hold up to the forces involved.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator

Answer 5

Hi. Rappelling down does not remove your speed. If fact since you are bound by the law of conservation of angular momentum, you would actually speed up as you got closer to the surface. Too bad, it sounds like fun.

Answer 6

ISS FUBAR is moving at ~5 miles/second relative to the atmosphere (subtract 1000 mph if you like). An air molecule traveling at 5 miles/second is at an average temp of ~32,000 C.

That is why nobody "rapples" downward. Their butt would combust, ditto their skeleton.

Answer 7

It is a common misconception with people that satellites just sit there in space.

People need to get over this Earthbound notion of being stationary.

NOTHING IS STATIONARY IN SPACE, FOLKS