It ’s what theNew York Timescalls “ the late in a parade of spacecraft falling from the sky ” : the close at hand crash of the European Space Agency’sGravity Field and Steady - State Ocean Circulation Explorersatellite ( or GOCE ) .
reasonably implausibly , no one has any real theme where it will set ashore — due to its orbit , “ almost all places on Earth give-up the ghost beneath it at some point”—and parts of the satellite , weigh as much as 200 pounds , are expected to survive the long and fiery journeying back down to the Earth ’s surface . That could do some significant damage .
In fact , nearly 100 short ton of quad debris will fall from the sky in the twelvemonth 2013 alone , a slow and firm rainfall of machines that bring to mind Robert Charles Wilson ’s scifi novelAxis . In a beautiful cable , Wilson write that “ the sky filled with the aglow debris of ancient , incomprehensible machines , ” an ashen snow drifting down to the planet , forming mechanical drifts across the landscape painting .
Orbital debris is a produce problem — as anyone who ’s seenGravitycan attest — but not all of those old , abandoned ship , and broken spacecraft will crash , fall uncontrolled back to Earth . satellite are normally parked in agraveyard orbitor otherwise “ decommissioned , ” efficaciously dropped back to the planet using pusher and some very thrifty math , steered safely into the ocean , far from state ( and major cities ) .
Indeed , a remote neighborhood of the South Pacific is colloquially bonk as a “ ballistic capsule burial ground . ” As the always - trusty Russian news siteRTdescribes it :
The Spacecraft Cemetery is an orbit of the South Pacific , some 3,900 km from the capital of New Zealand , Wellington . It is used to stick the remains of space vehicle that do not burn up on re - first appearance into the Earth ’s standard atmosphere , such as the carcass of the Russian Mir outer space post and waste - filled freight ships .
The remote fix was specially selected for the garbage disposal of space vehicle because of its depth of four kilometer and distance from shipping lane .
GOCE , of course , will not get the honor of this entombment at sea . Where it falls through its perfervid break - up is anyone ’s guess — but don your hardhat and abuse outside to watch the skies any fourth dimension from Sunday night , Eastern clip , on into Monday good morning . [ New York Times ]
Image : European Space Agency
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