SPACE JUNK: Half a Century After Launched, Decommissioned Soviet Spacecraft Will Fall Back to Earth This Week – Most Populated Cities in the Planet Are on Its Deadly Trail
For half a century, lost Soviet satellite Kosmos 482 circled in the Earth’s orbit after the rocket propelling it failed to send it to Venus to fulfill its mission.
Now it will crash back on Earth – 1,100 pounds of space junk expected to hit our planet anywhere between May 9 and May 13.
An astronomer has at this point calculated roughly where it might land, and all of the world’s most populated cities are directly in its ‘firing line’.
Daily Mail reported:
“Satellite tracker and astronomer at the Delft University of Technology Dr Marco Langbroek predicts the satellite will land between latitude 52 degrees north and 52 degrees south.
Worryingly, if it does collide with a populated area, Dr Langbroek warns that the out-of-control satellite could prove deadly.”
Kosmos 482’s 1972 mission was to gather information about Venus, but the soviet rocket carrying it suffered an engine malfunction, leaving the broken probe circling Earth’s orbit.
“Scientists now believe that an object making its way towards Earth at 17,000 mph is Kosmos 482’s landing module, the final missing piece of the probe.”
The estimated landing locations cover almost all Earth’s populated regions, with every most populated city in the risk area.
“Likewise, the exact timing of the landing is still uncertain, but most predictions center around May 10 or the early hours of May 11. Dr Langbroek says: ‘The risks involved are not particularly high, but not zero’.”
It is probable that the probe will land in one of the oceans.
“[Astronomer Dr Jonathan McDowell] says: ‘If you land something in a random part of the Earth, the chance that it hits a person is about one in 10,000. The chance that it hits you is then one in 10 billion – smaller than that’.”
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