satellite_reenter_011203Updated: Story first published 12:45 p.m., December 3
WASHINGTON -- Weighing in at over a ton, the Japanese Earth Resource Satellite-1 (JERS-1) plunged from orbit and reentered the Earth's atmosphere today. Pieces of the defunct spacecraft likely survived the fiery fall and hit Earth.
In a NASDA statement released today, and based on information provided by NASA to the Japanese space agency, JERS-1 re-entered around sixty-seven degrees south latitude and twenty degrees west longitude over the south Antarctic offshore Antarctica approximately, 8:28 a.m. EST, December 3rd.
The JERS-1 had been circling Earth since February 1992, rocketed into orbit by the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) courtesy of an H-1 Launch Vehicle from Tanegashima Space Center.
The satellite was replete with a large solar panel and radar antenna. At the time of launch, it tipped the scales at about 1.4 tons ( 2,800 kilograms).
Studies performed by NASDA reentry experts showed that much of box-shaped JERS-1 structure would disintegrate completely as it took a tumble toward Earth. Frictional heat as satellite hardware streaks through dense layers of atmosphere should have destroyed the parts completely.
However, some titanium materials used in the craft's propellant tanks were thought likely to beat the heat as they streak through the atmosphere, then smack into the ground or ocean. NASDA re-entry analysts say that a modest 15 pounds (7 kilograms) of titanium might survive to the ground, at a maximum.
Difficult to predict when and where
It is difficult to predict the exact time of reentry and where satellite fragments may fall. Odds were good, however -- given that most of Earth is water-covered -- that the remains of JERS-1 would safely flutter into seawaters.
Solar activities make it difficult to predict the exact timing of satellite burn-ups. For this reason, there is a plus or minus 5-hour error window up to a day prior to the satellite's re-entry.
NASDA was networked with NASA, as well as Japan's Bisei Spaceguard Association in Okayama Prefecture, Japan, in a cooperative effort to help predict the satellite's atmospheric re-entry.
JERS-1 operated far longer than its initial two-year design life.
The spacecraft gathered data on global landmasses, while making more pinpoint land survey observations. It was extensively utilized for agricultural, forestry, and fishing purposes, environmental protection, disaster prevention and coastal surveillance, with emphasis on locating natural resources.
Use of the remote sensing craft ended in October 1998.
Another day, another fall
It seems that another fall of space junk caught the attention of skywatchers on December 1. A large display of falling objects blazed through clear skies over Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska.
According to Nicholas Johnson, head of the space debris office at the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, Saturday's fall of space flotsam has been identified. It was an upper stage of the Russian Proton launch vehicle that inserted three GLONASS (navigation) satellites into orbit on December 1, he told SPACE.com.
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