With the completion of the STS-119 shuttle mission, the ISS is nearing completion and now for the first time appears (almost completely) as artists have been depicting it since the 1990’s. A few budget cuts have been made since and with the Columbia accident some components had to be cut due to the inability of the remaining shuttle missions to completely deliver components.
As some who know me are aware, I built a scale model of the International Space Station from scratch a few years back spanning from 2004-2006, putting in over 175 hours into the project. I made sure that in representing the station, it would mimic its final form and for the first time since I finished the model two and half years ago, it nearly represents reality (at least as far as the station’s solar panels are concerned.)
Here’s a comparison of my model and the ISS as it appeared from the shuttle as it left station last week. (Note the space shuttle in my model is built to the same scale as the space station).