Elon Musk has called for NASA to deorbit it’s International Space Station (ISS) ‘as soon as possible’ because the $150 billion lab has ‘served its purpose.’
In Thursday post on X, he wrote: ‘It is time to begin preparations for deorbiting the [ISS]. It has served its purpose. There is very little incremental utility. Let’s go to Mars.’
The ISS is nearing the end of its operational lifespan and is showing signs of wear and tear — developing cracks, leaks and other maintenance issues.
Last November, for example, a leak in the Russian segment that had been worsening for five years sparked fears that the astronauts on board may need to evacuate, as NASA warned it could lead to a ‘catastrophic failure’ of the space station.
The astronauts have been patching the leak and keeping the module it’s located in mostly sealed off to eliminate any immediate threat to their safety.
This and other alarming maintenance issues are partly what drove NASA and its ISS partners — Russia, Japan, Canada and 11 European countries — to make plans to retire the ISS by 2030, tasking Musk’s SpaceX with building the deorbit spacecraft.
But he apparently thinks five years from now isn’t soon enough.
In a follow-up X post, Musk added that he would like to see the space station brought down ASAP, ideally ‘two years from now.’ But he also said the decision is ‘up to the president.’
SpaceX Chief Executive Elon Musk said the ISS should be decommissioned ‘as soon as possible’ on Thursday. That same day, he spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference while wielding a chainsaw he received from Argentina’s president
In a post on X, a social media site Musk owns, he said he recommends bringing the ISS down two years from now, which would be three years ahead of NASA’s current deorbit plan
That’s not entirely true, however. Decommissioning the ISS ahead of schedule would require agreement from all the space station’s partners, not just the US president.
President Donald Trump could propose shutting down the space station before 2030, but in addition to getting the other ISS partners on board, funding for the deorbit mission has to come from Congress.
In June 2024, NASA awarded SpaceX a $843 million contract to build the deorbit vehicle, or USDV, that will be used to safely guide the ISS back into the Pacific Ocean in 2030.
But that contract only covers the cost of the USDV, not the entire deorbit mission. Last summer, then-NASA Administrator Bill Nelson was seeking $1.5 billion from Congress to cover it all.
That said, Musk’s recent statements should not be taken lightly.
Not only is he Chief Executive of SpaceX, the world’s leading commercial spaceflight company that will play critical role in the ISS’s end-of-life plan, he is also the face of Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
As one of Trump’s senior advisors, Musk has the president’s ear on numerous issues, including the future of American space exploration.
For years, Musk has said that Mars should be the next frontier, dismissing other potential missions such as NASA’s return to the moon as ‘distractions.’
The ISS is nearing the end of its operational lifespan and is showing signs of wear and tear from collisions with various space objects. The Canadarm2 robot arm was struck by space debris in May 2021, creating a hole that fortunately didn’t impact its functionality
ESA astronaut Tim Peake took this photo from inside the ISS’s Cupola module in 2016, showing a 7 mm-diameter circular chip gouged out by the impact from a tiny piece of space debris
One of the most likely reasons Musk wants to decommission the ISS sooner than planned is that it would free up time, resources and funds to propel humanity toward Mars
NASA has set its sights on the Red Planet too, but the agency does not appear to share Musk’s sense of urgency, or his desire to eliminate the ISS ASAP
From his Thursday statement, it would appear that he sees the ISS as a distraction (and likely a waste of money), implying that it is no longer useful enough to justify maintaining it until 2030.
Though Musk has not said this outright, one of the most likely reasons he wants to decommission the ISS sooner than planned is that it would free up time, resources and funds to propel humanity toward Mars.
NASA has set its sights on the Red Planet too, but the agency does not appear to share Musk’s sense of urgency, or his desire to eliminate the ISS ASAP.
In a statement given to multiple news organizations Thursday, NASA officials said the ISS supports research and training that will lay the foundation for future Mars missions.
‘NASA’s current mission plans call for using the International Space Station, and future commercial space stations, in low Earth orbit to conduct groundbreaking science, as well as a training ground for crewed missions to the moon and Mars.
‘We’re looking forward to hearing more about the Trump Administration’s plans for our agency and expanding exploration for the benefit of all.’
