SPACE.com -- Italian Satellite Poised to Fall to Earth Any Moment

The BeppoSAX spacecraft is an Earth-orbitting X-ray satellite. It's operated by the Italian Space Agency, and the Netherlands Agency for Aerospace. Click to enlarge.


	Italian Satellite Poised to Fall to Earth Any Moment By Robert Roy Britt Senior Science Writer posted: 05:13 pm ET 29 April 2003

Italys BeppoSAX astronomy satellite is expected to fall to Earth by early Wednesday, Italian Space Agency (ISA) officials said today

Italys BeppoSAX satellite is expected to fall to Earth by early Wednesday, Italian Space Agency (ISA) officials said today.

Most of the debris will likely land in the ocean, but officials have warned several countries along the potential path, which circles Earth in the vicinity of the equator.

The latest projections have the craft coming down between 6:57 p.m. ET (22:57 UTC) on Tuesday, April 29 and 2:13 a.m. ET (06:13 UTC) Wednesday.

The satellite was shut down at the end of April, 2002 and has been gradually descending ever since, being pulled down inexorably by Earth's atmosphere. As the craft reached denser portions of the atmosphere in recent hours, officials have refined their prediction of when and where it would come down.

BeppoSAX, an astronomy satellite launched in 1996, will likely break into many pieces. The ISA had previously said as many as 40 fragments, some weighing up to 265 pounds (120 kilograms) could reach the surface.

Today, the agency removed a few places from the list of those that could be hit. The countries or territories that might still be potentially hit by fragments:

Africa: Burundi, Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Kenya, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, Tanzania
Asia: Indonesia, Malaysia, Maldives, Singapore
Oceania: Baker Island (USA), Federated States of Micronesia, Howland Island (USA), Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea
South America: Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Venezuela

Officials said there might be hydrazine propellant or battery chemicals on any parts that reach Earth, and warned against handling the pieces or inhaling the substance.

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