The Second Space Station
Tensions were high in KSC command room. Today would mark the day that the second orbital station around Kerbin would become a fact, but where one might think that this would be cause for excitement and joy, most Kerbals thought of this with stress.
It was not without reason. Ever since the botched landings of Orbiter 1 and 3 had KSC had suspended the operations of the Orbiter until more tests had been done and it had led to many frustrations between the operators of the Space X hotel and KSC command. Though it was understandable that KSC wanted more safety, it also meant that business for Space X was frozen.
And so when the second space hotel module was launched, Space X was facing a dilemma. The Castor and Charon were capable of delivering a science crew, but were underpowered for space tourism. The only way circumvent KSC control over what docks with the station, is to create their own station.
But the hotel modules were dumb modules without the facilities to support a crew. In fact, to assemble them they had to rely on the docked Eagle and Orbiter 2 for maneuvering and docking. However, Kerbia had offered a solution to the problem. The aging Salyut-1 was due to be deorbited but now it could be offered to SpaceX to function as a core module for the Space hotel.
It was not fancy but it provided power, cooling, attenuation thrusters, trash space, and communication. It was proven and still had about 2 years of station-keeping left at this altitude. And so Salyut station became once again operational. This time under commercial control. It would require an engineering flight to become operational, but at least Space X could start prepping Orbiter 3 for a new launch and start collecting sweet revenues from the growing list of space tourists. Thus Space City was born.
Commercial Resupplies
Meanwhile, the Kerbia Orbital Service (KOS) launched a second Charon Heavy. It was still not cleared for manned flight but it could carry enough cargo to supply a crew of three for 150 days. This meant that KSC would hire them for cargo and resupply missions to UKSS while they tried to figure out reentry and reusability.
This time reentry was better aligned but a higher orbit meant coming back at higher velocity. The new drogue chute was deploying at supersonic speeds but managed to slow the stack down. Landing gear deployed, some 5 km from KSC and people stood by for the breaking burn.
Which proved to be too much and the whole stack toppled over and crashed. Clearly, there were some improvements to be made. Perhaps shutting down the outer engines would provide more control. Meanwhile, Charon Heavy continued the journey to UKSS01 and docked with the supply port where it would stay for 100 days.
The First Citizens of Space City
No longer bound to the KSC ban, Orbiter 03 launched from the Kerbia Launch site to bring 7 tourists to Space City. Captain Samus Kerman was an experienced pilot who managed the direct rendez-vous with Space City, as Salyut-01 was now called without any problems.
They docked with the SpaceX-01 module as all previous models had done and spent 5 days in space, whilst unloading supplies to the station. Meanwhile, engineer Sampond Kerman removed some of the wiring and thrusters that would make future dockings easier. He also checked the second docking connector and confirmed a shuttle could dock there.
After a great holiday, Orbiter 03 undocked and started a re-entry. Now, new batteries would overcome the problem of the last descent, but also a mono prop fuel cell had been added, but this time all went fine.
“This is your captain speaking, we’ve overshot our landing zone a bit, and are 43 km away. I am powering up the engines for a cruise back.” Samus told the crew. Some minutes later, however: “Here is your captain again, faster your seatbelts, we have run out of fuel and currently still 9.2 km from the landing strip and traveling at 7km altitude, I will attempt to glide back, nothing to worry about.” And indeed after a gentle glide, the plane touched down quite fast but the drogue chute did its job.
“Welcome back!” Please fly with us again.”
KSC Archives 