Posted on 01/13/2012 6:55:58 PM PST by BenLurkin
A coordinated global campaign is monitoring a wayward Russian Mars probe that's slated to crash to Earth in the next few days, the European Space Agency has announced.
The doomed Phobos-Grunt spacecraft, which Russian officials estimate will re-enter Earth's atmosphere between Saturday and Monday, is now officially a target for the 12-member Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee, or IADC for short.
"An IADC re-entry prediction campaign is ongoing since Jan. 2. Phobos-Grunt was identified to be no high-risk object," said Heiner Klinkrad, head of the space debris office at the European Space Agency's (ESA) European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany. "Hence, this will be adopted as our annual 'test campaign' for 2012," he told Space.com.
The determination that Phobos-Grunt is not a high-risk piece of space junk is due to the relatively low dry mass of the errant spacecraft — just 2.5 tons. There's about 11 tons of toxic propellant onboard, adding up to the probe’s total mass of 13.5 tons.
According to ESA, studies by the Russian space agency (known as Roscosmos) and NASA indicate that Phobos-Grunt's fuel tanks should burst high above the Earth, releasing a load of propellant that will subsequently dissipate.
... said Alice Gorman, a lecturer in the School of Humanities, Department of Archaeology, at Flinders University in South Australia.
"More than 50 percent of all re-entered spacecraft material is titanium, beryllium or steel, which has a melting point twice that of aluminum, so the likelihood of the fuel tanks surviving is very low,” Gorman said. "The fuel is reported to be hydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide, which boil at 113 degrees Celsius and 21 degrees C (235 F to 69 F) respectively, so it will evaporate at high altitude once the tanks go."
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
We “know” to get to Mars we leave earth and move “out”. But where would we go if we started at the North Pole and went straight “up”? Or if we started at the South Pole and went straight “down”? And what does it look like?
It's nearly a miracle that we have been able to do it. Really awesome.
Shit. Why didn’t I get the memo BEFORE???
So, wasn't the chance of toxic hydrazine coming down the reason we shot down our errant satellite back in '08??? At first blush it would seem someone is lying. I mean, was the hydrazine really a danger then? Or are they downplaying the danger now?
The only explanation that comes to mind is that our satellite was "dead" and the heaters had shut down and the hydrazine had frozen. Maybe this bird is still semi-alive and the hydrazine is in liquid form and thus more likely to dissipate rather than crash land?
What’s the chances of it flaming out? That would put on a good show.
Hey, how about that as a really avante garde, expensive art form? Trying various chemicals/compounds/states at re-entry... I'd rather the NEA fund that than some idiot putting a cross in urine...
My thoughts as well.
New NASA Probe on its Way to Mars
http://www.thenewamerican.com/tech-mainmenu-30/space/9961-new-nasa-probe-on-its-way-to-mars
I’m thinking there are a lot of possible answers, depending on your velocity leaving the pole.
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