Second giant chunk of space junk heading for Earth

[snagglepuss]

Source: Telegraph UK

The 2.4-ton Röntgensatellit, or ROSAT, has been spinning aimlessly through space for 12 years after it was switched off in 1999 after its guidance system broke.

snip

However, it is now believed that pieces of space junk weighing up to 400kg could smash into the planet’s surface as early as the end of October

snip

NASA experts have calculated that ROSAT is more than 50% more likely to cause death, injury or property damage on Earth than UARS, although the chance is still 2,000 to one.

snip

Heiner Klinkrad, the head of the space debris office at the European Space Agency, also told the magazine: “ROSAT has a large mirror structure that survives high re-entry temperatures.







Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/8785878/Second-giant-chunk-of-space-junk-heading-for-Earth.html

---

Well ain't that grand, a 400 kg mirror falling to Earth in one piece. The article also states that more old space junk will be falling to Earth in the next little while given the increase in solar activity. :(

[Avalux]

1. Henny Penny wasn't so crazy after all.

The sky really IS falling. x(

[Thor_MN]

2. Dang, how many years bad luck for breaking a 400 kg mirror?

[snagglepuss]

5. LOL. Good one.

[No Elephants]

15. Seven years per one broken mirror. Whoever made that up did not specify size and it's too late

now to revise.

No do overs on wishing seven years bad stuff on folks.

[wundermaus]

3. Here is a golden opportunity...

for those military industrial complex hot shots to show off their star wars anti-ballistic missile muscle.
Let's see how good a shot they are at knocking a huge, unpowered hunk of space junk out into space.
Bet they can't do it. ALL talk and NO walk.

[Poll_Blind]

4. Good lord, that's an excellent point!

What a waste of resources that shit has been.

PB

[snagglepuss]

6. Good point. Apart from the fact that it is useless, they probably can't target falling

space debris because debris doesn't have a set trajectory, but that's just a guess. You'd think that dealing with this eventually would have been a priority. Where's the science and rationality of just letting potentially destructive things fall where they may?

[Psephos]

7. No, that would only be an opportunity for a space junk nightmare.

You may recall that the Chinese intentionally blew up an old weather satellite a few years back, creating a massive cloud of tiny bits of orbiting shrapnel all orbiting at thousands of miles per hour, like a swarm of bullets. That act of wanton pollution seriously pissed off every space agency on the planet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_missile_test

When you blow something up that's in orbit, the bits and pieces remain in orbit, except now in a dispersed mass. Over time, that cloud of junk smears out and expands. Any single tiny piece can puncture a spacecraft or spacesuit, with potential lethality. All of those bits must be tracked by ground radar. It's a huge headache.

The International Space Station had to take defensive actions in April this year due to potential collision with debris from the Chinese satellite explosion.

No way currently exists to chase down a satellite, rendezvous with it, attach boosters to it with precision, and motor it out to a higher orbit or eject it into space. The logistics and engineering precision needed to do that safely are mind-numbing. In a select group of low-Earth orbits, the Space Shuttle could retrieve certain satellites, but obviously that's no longer an option. Even when it was, the cost would have been measured in billions per mission.

Developing an alternative, non-STS system would cost many billions, and not be ready for a long time to come.

[Dover]

8. I think the Chinese were 'demonstrating' their weaponry, should there be any question

of their capabilities.

[Psephos]

10. Absolutely. n/t

[bleever]

13. This would be a good stand-alone post, because

we all should know what our money was spent on, when something is actually coming our way (and with plenty of warning).

[Historic NY]

9. Great.....we need some space junkmen.

[saras]

11. If they let you keep what you recovered, we'd have them in a decade.

[Liberty Belle]

12. If God is a Democrat, it would land on a GOP debate.

[No Elephants]

16. Jesus was a radical. Wouldn't know how to characterize God's politics.

Odd parenting, though.

[kickysnana]

14. Reminds me of an old Twilight Zone

They used to put slots in the backs of medicine cabinets to allow used safety razor blades to drop into the wall between the studs. This twilight zone had a high tech tiny gadget that you put the razor blades in that never filled up. All of sudden one day razor blades started falling out of nowhere raining down of people.

The plan for space junk is the same as nuclear storage and our economy and goodness knows what else.

[No Elephants]

18. Interesting. I take it the theme was along the lines of "No such thing as a

free lunch when it comes to disposing of our trash?"

Some folks still don't get that. If so, pretty cool for 1959-64.

[Frank Cannon]

17. Anyone remember the TV show Quark?

Quark's job was to collect garbage in space.



I always thought that seemed like a nifty idea.

[Old Troop]

19. Oh fuck. A giant mirror? How much bad luck will that cause?