Collision Between Old Racquet Body and Military Satellite Almost Occurred in Earth Orbit
An old rocket body and military satellite -- large pieces of space junk originating from the Soviet Union -- nearly collided with one another. On Friday morning, in a semi-disruptive state that nearly knocked down thousands of pieces of debris.
LeoLabs, a private company tracking satellites and debris in low Earth orbit, observed the close collision in radar data. The company, which can track objects as small as 3.9 inches (10 centimeters) in diameter, operates three radar stations, two in the US and one in New Zealand.
The two objects were moving towards each other at an altitude of 611 miles (984 kilometers) on Friday morning, January 27. [20 feet] with a margin of error of several dozen meters," the company said in a statement.
It's very close, Harvard astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell told Smithsonian V, in a tweet post. The SL-8 rocket body (NORAD ID 16511), specifically the second stage, has been in space since 1986, while the military satellite Cosmos 2361 (NORAD ID 25590), known as Parus, was launched into low Earth orbit in 1998. The collision between the two objects resulted in thousands of new fragments of debris that will remain in Earth orbit for several decades.
The event of conjunction in the orbitBad environmental conditions "It is located between 590 and 652 miles (950 and 1,050 kilometers) above the surface, according to LeoLabs. This band has it."Potential for producing debrisIn low Earth orbit "because of the combination of separating events and abandoned objects," the company explained in a series of tweets. host About 160 SL-8 rocket bodies have been launched along with about 160 loads in several decades. Leolab said about 1,400 encounters involving this rocket body have been carried out between June and September 2022.
Leolab Describes the type of possible collision between "two large abandoned objects" described as "worst-case scenario," saying that "most of it is beyond our control and likely to produce serious collision aftermath effects." In fact, a collision on this scale is almost certain to trigger the ongoing Kessler syndrome — the continuous accumulation of space debris that threatens to make parts of the Earth's orbit inaccessible.
Nearly missing in space is becoming increasingly common, however Conjunction between dead satellites or debris clouds threaten the International Space Station. Evasion maneuvers are now equipment for satellite operators, with SpaceX, as a real-life example, having to do more than 26,000 collision evasion maneuvers for the Starlink satellite from December 1, 2020 to November 30, 2022.
In addition to focusing on collision avoidance, LeoLabs suggests running mitigation and debris management efforts. This can also be sensible guidelines...
