NASA Confirms Origin of Space Junk That Crashed Through Florida Home
DannyB writes:
NASA confirms origin of space junk that crashed through Florida home
The 1.6-pound metal object should have burned up in the Earth's atmosphere.
[....] The agency analyzed the cylindrical object after it tore through the roof and two floors of a house in Naples on March 8th and established that it came from a cargo pallet of aging batteries that was released from the ISS back in 2021.
More specifically, NASA revealed in a blog post on Monday that the offending object was a support component used to mount the batteries on the 5,800-pound (2,630-kilogram) pallet released from the space station. Made from Inconel (a metal alloy that can withstand extreme environments like high temperature, pressure, or mechanical loads), the recovered stanchion weighs 1.6 pounds and measures four inches high by 1.6 inches in diameter - a smidge smaller than a standard can of Red Bull.
Object that slammed into Florida home was indeed space junk from ISS, NASA confirms
It was part of a pallet jettisoned along with 5,800 pounds of aging batteries back in March 2021.
We covered the story here: Trash From The International Space Station May Have Hit A House In Florida
That home, in the seaside city of Naples, belongs to Alejandro Otero. Shortly after the March 8 incident, Otero said he thought the offending object was part of a cargo pallet packed with 5,800 pounds (2,630 kilograms) of aging batteries jettisoned from the ISS in March 2021.
And he was right, according to a new NASA analysis of the object, which was performed at Florida's Kennedy Space Center.
[....] The nickel-hydride batteries were dumped after new lithium-ion versions were delivered to the ISS for a power-supply upgrade. The pallet and the batteries were expected to burn up completely in Earth's atmosphere, NASA officials said in today's update - yet that didn't happen, and the agency wants to learn why.
[....] "NASA specialists use engineering models to estimate how objects heat up and break apart during atmospheric reentry," they added. "These models require detailed input parameters and are regularly updated when debris is found to have survived atmospheric reentry to the ground."
[....] And, as has been demonstrated, some of this junk comes crashing back to Earth from time to time. For instance, the 23-ton core stages of China's powerful Long March 5B rocket routinely fall in an uncontrolled fashion a week or so after their launches, to the consternation of the international space community.
NASA's new analysis may have financial consequences for the agency and for Otero, by the way.
Don't look up. It's a sign of things to come.
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