SpaceX will bring ISS back to Earth

Image source, NASA

Image caption, The International Space Station is a platform in space where astronauts conduct science experiments

The American space agency NASA has given Elon Musk's company SpaceX permission to destroy the International Space Station (ISS).

But don't worry, not while there are any astronauts still inside.

The ISS was launched in 1998 and is run by the space agencies in Russia, Japan, the US, Europe and Canada.

More on the ISS

Image source, Reuters

Image caption, Elon Musk's company SpaceX has been tasked with bringing the ISS back to Earth

Astronauts from those countries have been living in it continuously since 2000.

And in that time, over 3300 science experiments have been conducted inside of it.

But it was only ever supposed to be up in space until 2030 at the latest.

So Elon Musk has been given the go ahead to bring the ISS out of space and down to Earth.

Image source, NASA

Image caption, Another option was to manually disassemble the space station and reuse some of its parts, but it came with complex issues and high costs

How will SpaceX destroy the ISS?

The company have been paid $843m (拢666.4m) to build a machine that will effectively tow the ISS from space to Earth.

As it hits the Earth's atmosphere, it will break into pieces, and land in the ocean.

The part of the sea they're aiming for is an area well away from any people called Point Nemo.

Image source, Reuters

Image caption, NASA is hoping that private companies will launch their own space stations to replace the ISS

While SpaceX will build the machine, NASA will operate it during the mission.

Neither NASA nor SpaceX have released plans of how the machine will be built yet, but it will require a lot of power to pull the station (which is roughly the size of a football pitch) out of orbit.

According to the European Space Agency, operating the ISS has cost 鈧100bn (拢84.6bn) over 30 years.