Question about ISS.

[Tom Hendricks]

Say NASA has to abandon the ISS. If you could launch a space vehicle without the Air Forces Space Command discovering it. Would NASA have a way of telling if you docked with the ISS and went on board?

Working on a story idea, any help would be appreciated.

 

[sojourner]

Assuming NASA was still recieving telemetry from the ISS? Yes, I would guess that the actual docking would trigger a notification. Nevermind changes in internal temp, oxygen/carbon levels, internal cameras, electrical load...

 

[SchwEnt]

I'd have to say, yeah sure.

The ISS is capable of limited unmanned operations.
So Mission Control has some remote monitoring/control. Amongst those remote ops would have to be (at the very least) indicators on the airlocks "AIRLOCK OPEN" and "AIRLOCK CLOSED". So they'd know if someone was opening and closing the airlocks. And there are video cams that monitor throughout the ISS, allowing a good look-see if anyone was sneaking aboard (before they shut the cams off).

 

[YellowSubmarine]

Any space station burglar worth his salt can cause electrical malfunction in any alarm or surveillance equipment. Haven't you seen any films?

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Jam the telemetry by generating wide spectrum EM noise. Even better, do it during a solar storm so it gets the blame. Once you're inside, set up fake telemetry and insert dummy feeds of nothing happening into the cameras like in just about every bank heist movie. Now you're ready to start aiming those mega death laser cannons at the Earth - wait, what do you mean the ISS doesn't have any of those?

 

[YellowSubmarine]

Would destroying the antenna arrays be enough though? A big rain of space “debris” to take off the array, then dock with an asteroid-shaped spacecraft so that it looks like a collision through a ground telescope...

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Just putting a sufficiently thick metal shield in front of the antenna would block the signal. I doubt that anyone would believe that a small asteroid would be likely to collide very slowly with the ISS. I think you could paint your spacecraft matt black to hide it sufficiently from ground-based telescopes for a while. Transits of bodies such as the Sun or Moon would give you away, of course.

ETA: After looking at descriptions of the ISS structure, I'm not certain whether the Zvezda service module houses the only communications antennae (including the ham radio ones and not counting the one on the Soyuz). It seems unlikely that this would be the case - for reasons of redundancy, I would imagine that there are alternate antennae that can be used.

 

[sojourner]

The real problem is trying to "hide" an approaching spacecraft. Even if you get to ISS the minute communications are lost with NASA you can bet that several hundred telescopes that receive images from various spectrum are going to be pointed at it. At which point "painting it black" is not, and most likely never would, hide your ship.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

So the Algeron treaty is actually preventing us from illegally docking to the station? Damn.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I guess you could stick radiator fins out the far side and try to cool the skin down to 2.7K, but yes, I guess the departure from the CBR might well be detectable from the ground. However, I don't think disguising it as a slow-moving asteroid causing a fender bender would fool anyone either.

 

[JustAFriend]

Now you're ready to start aiming those mega death laser cannons at the Earth - wait, what do you mean the ISS doesn't have any of those?

Are we sure???

The '70s Soviet Almaz/Salyut station had a 23mm automatic cannon....

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Sneaky...however, not much use against a target on Earth.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Perhaps more effective against spam though...

 

[arch101]

This thread belongs in the "Evil Plots or Ernst Stavro Blofeld" file

 

[Mr. B]

What would be the point of trying to hide the fact you're breaking in? It's no like we really have the means to do anything about it.

 

[Tom Hendricks]

To remove something without anyone noticing.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

To remove something without anyone noticing.

Getting in and out of the ISS is just not going to happen without anyone noticing, though you might be able to make off with something and not have anyone readily be aware of what you took.

Then, you return to Earth and splash down in the ocean where you have a submarine waiting to pick you up. Have the sub dive and take you to your secret base (wherever that is) and no one will be able to figure out where you went. They'll eventually figure out what you took (presumably everything on the station is fully inventoried) but by then you'll be impossible to find.

 

[Squiggy]

To remove something without anyone noticing.

Anything of value is going to be returned to Earth when the station is demanned.

 

[sojourner]

^Only if it's small enough.

 

[Tom Hendricks]

Do you think they would take one of the lesser experiments with them? Say like the protein crystallization experiment?

To remove something without anyone noticing.

Anything of value is going to be returned to Earth when the station is demanned.