Scientists are expecting a shower of space debris today …
According to the European Space Agency, something is going to fall to Earth on Friday, 13 November. A mysterious piece of space debris named WT1190F is predicted to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere at around 06:20 GMT in the skies above the Indian Ocean. While it’s expected to burn up in the atmosphere about 100km off the south coast of Sri Lanka, it is not impossible that smaller fragments could crash onto the surface.
The object must be the remains from a previous space mission, most likely a spent rocket from one of the recent robotic moon missions or even a relic from the Apollo era. But while it may seem like a bad omen, scientists are excited. It is notoriously difficult to predict exactly where debris that fall to the Earth will hit, so the opportunity to study the trajectory of WT1190F could help improve current methods…
According to astronomers who have estimated its size and density, the object is about 1-2 meters in diameter and hollow. Luckily that means it is too small and fragile to be likely to make it to the surface. As it disintegrates, the smaller fragments will rapidly burn up creating a brilliant display of fireballs that may be visible streaking across the midday sky to the south of Sri Lanka. Only very small fragments, if anything, will splashdown in the Indian Ocean. There simply isn’t enough mass involved for this to be a cause for too much concern…
Predicting the trajectory of these object is difficult. Remember Skylab?
However, it is not always easy to predict. When it became clear that NASA’s 75-tonne Skylab space station was going to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere in July 1979, NASA estimated that the chances of a human being hit somewhere on the planet was one in 152.
Ultimately, instead of re-entering over the ocean south-east of South Africa while speeding eastwards, Skylab burned up slightly later than expected and fragments fell to Earth south-east of Perth, in Western Australia. While nobody was injured, Skylab’s demise highlighted uncertainties in the re-entry estimates of the day. Skylab turned out to be sturdier than expected, meaning the drag of the tumbling space station had been miscalculated.
Well, another close call from space…
A good excuse to listen to Zappa’s “Cosmic Debris” from Apostrophe
(although that’s about superstition, religion, and woo, and not really about detritus falling from the sky).
Is that a real poncho or a Sears poncho?
You could make more money as a butcher!