Get a glass of Tang and join us for a lofty episode on America's first space station: Skylab! When NASA launched the project in 1973, it heralded a new era of space exploration and scientific progression - one that was still, unfortunately, subject to the law of gravity. When Skylab's orbit began to fail in 1978, NASA engineers found that they couldn't quite aim it for the ocean the way they'd hoped - and they also couldn't quite predict where the flaming tons of wreckage might crash down. Cue the bookies, Chicken Little parties, 'Skylab Repellant Spray', and a slew of other weirdness ranging from the Miss Universe 1979 Pageant to a littering bill from rural Western Australia that went unpaid for thirty years. Along the way we'll cover the Skylab missions, solar activity, spiders in space, and why Ella worries about space junk falling on her head.

Bonus: dear listeners, it's our fortieth (!) episode and the end of Season One! We'd love to hear your thoughts on the past season and ideas for Season Two - you can email us at [email protected] or drop us a DM on Instagram @relative.disasters

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Sources for this episode include:

Spacelab: A Chronology/ A Classroom in Space

Chicago Tribune. January 11, 1975 - "Skylab Rocket Debris Falls in Indian Ocean"

Karimnagar: Revisiting the Day Skylab Fell by Puli Sharat Kumar

Balladonia, Skylab crash site in Australia: How a fallen space station caused mayhem in the outback by David Whitley

The Strange Tale of the Skylab's Fall From Orbit by Rebecca J. Rosen