🛰️ Space Stations: Living in Orbit

What you’ll learn

1. The First OutpostsUnderstand how Salyut and Skylab proved humans could live in orbit, and the dangers they revealed.Salyut 1 became the first space station in 1971, though its first crew died during reentry. America's Skylab followed in 1973, surviving launch damage thanks to daring crew repairs. These early outposts proved humans could live and work in orbit for weeks and began the endurance research that longer missions would need.
2. Mir: A Decade in OrbitTrace Mir's modular design, endurance records, near-disasters, and its role in US-Russian partnership.Launched in 1986, Mir was the first modular station, inhabited for nearly a decade and home to Polyakov's record 437-day flight. It survived a dangerous fire in 1997 and a collision that punctured its Spektr module. The Shuttle-Mir program turned Cold War rivals into partners, paving the way for the ISS.
3. Building the ISSLearn how the ISS was assembled, sustained, and kept continuously inhabited by an international partnership.The ISS, a partnership of five agencies and fifteen nations, is roughly the size of a football field and orbits 400 kilometers up. Assembled in orbit from 1998 across dozens of launches, it has been continuously crewed since November 2000, sustained by robotic arms and a fleet of cargo ships.
4. Daily Life in MicrogravityUnderstand the real routines of sleeping, eating, exercising, and staying healthy in weightlessness.Astronauts follow a scheduled day of science, maintenance, and two hours of vital exercise, sleeping strapped into wall cabins and eating from pouches with magnetized trays. They wash without showers and recycle even urine into drinking water. The Cupola's view of Earth provides a profound emotional counterweight to confinement.
5. Science and the FutureGrasp the unique science stations enable and where orbital habitation goes after the ISS.The ISS enables experiments impossible under gravity, from combustion and materials to studying the human body as preparation for Mars. As the ISS retires around 2030, NASA will rent commercial stations, and lessons from decades in orbit feed directly into the lunar Gateway and deep-space exploration.

Questions this course answers

Grounded in trusted sources

• NASA
• European Space Agency
• Roscosmos
• The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

Every Wunder lesson is built from real, reputable sources — never invented.

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