Skylab Skylab Skylab was a United States space station launched and operated by NASA, and occupied for about 24 weeks between May 1973 and February 1974 – the only space station the U.S. has operated exclusively. In 1979 it fell back to Earth amid huge worldwide media attention. Skylab included a workshop, a solar observatory, and other systems necessary for crew survival and scientific experiments. It was launched unmanned by a modified Saturn V rocket, with a weight of . Lifting Skylab into low earth orbit was the final mission and launch of a Saturn V rocket (famous for carrying the
Bigelow Commercial Space Station with the first module to be launched no earlier than 2016. The CSS Skywalker (Commercial Space Station Skywalker) was a 2005 concept for the first "space hotel" by Bigelow Aerospace. The Skywalker was designed to be composed of multiple Nautilus (B330) habitat modules, which would be inflated and connected upon reaching orbit. An MDPM (Multi-Directional Propulsion Module) would allow the Skywalker to be moved into interplanetary or lunar trajectories. In short, CSS Skywalker was "an effort to build the planet's first orbiting space hotel, [with a projected] room rate of USD$1 million per night", and a hoped-for launch date for