Chinese Booster Rocket Crashing Down to Earth
looorg writes:
'Out-of-control' Chinese rocket falling to Earth could partially survive re-entry:
Part of a huge rocket that launched China's first module for its Tianhe space station is falling back to Earth and could make an uncontrolled re-entry at an unknown landing point.
The 30-metre high core of the Long March 5B rocket launched the "Heavenly Harmony" unmanned core module into low Earth orbit on 29 April from Wenchang in China's Hainan province.
The Long March 5B then itself entered a temporary orbit, setting the stage for one of the largest ever uncontrolled re-entries. Some experts fear it could land on an inhabited area.
"It's potentially not good," said Jonathan McDowell, Astrophysicist at the Astrophysics Center at Harvard University.
"Last time they launched a Long March 5B rocket they ended up with big long rods of metal flying through the sky and damaging several buildings in the Ivory Coast," he said.
"Most of it burned up, but there were these enormous pieces of metal that hit the ground. We are very lucky no one was hurt."
On Tuesday the core was orbiting Earth around every 90 minutes at about 27,600km/h and an altitude of more than 300km. The US military has named it 2021-035B and its path can be seen on websites including orbit.ing-now.com.
Since the weekend it has dropped nearly 80km in altitude and SpaceNews reported that amateur ground observations showed it was tumbling and not under control. This, and its speed, makes it impossible to predict where it will land when Earth's atmosphere eventually drags it down, though McDowell said the most likely outcome is that it will fall into the sea, as the ocean covers about 71% of the planet.
But McDowell says some pieces of the rocket will survive re-entry and that it would be the "equivalent of a small plane crash scattered over 100 miles".
You can also track the booster's locations, path, and altitude online at n2yo.com
According to this link, on 2021-05-07 at 0338 UTC the booster dipped to an altitude of 100 miles (160 km) while over the Indian Ocean. At that time it was approximately midway between the Suez Canal and Southernmost Australia. Just 45 minutes later it reached the high point of its orbit at 153 miles (248 km) just after passing over the Gulf of Mexico and northern Florida.
Also at Ars Technica.
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