Comments on: NASA UARS Satellite Crash Site: Near Christmas Island in Pacific

By: christmas Gifts

christmas Gifts — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 16:31:26 +0000

Christmas 2012…ohh yeah, I would love 2012 comes faster.

By: Dee

Dee — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 14:31:19 +0000

I like how NASA claims there were no reports of debris from the “geographical” area, but reports were made to them about something falling out of the sky and killing one woman and injuring nine others in Monte Grande, Argentina around 2:00 am last Monday morning. There were thirty witnesses. A conclusion as to what happened is still being investigated. I doubt we’ll hear anything about what was found in the rubble. And yet there was still another report that small pieces may have been found on the Australian island of Hobart, Tasmania.

By: Abbe

Abbe — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 14:10:53 +0000

It is having a great time on the Island for Misfit Sattelites.

By: GOZAR

GOZAR — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 00:16:56 +0000

Rek: “From what i’ve read, it did have fuel, though it was used up throughout the years, used to reposition itself or move out of harms way.” — I believe I read that it also had some at its end of life, so they lowered the orbit partway down, and atmospheric drag slowly dragged it down the rest of the way. I assume they simply didn’t have enough propellant (which is fuel plus oxidizer) to bring it all the way down and thus completely control the reentry.

By: SuperGeorge

SuperGeorge — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 00:15:19 +0000

NASA said do not touch metalic pieces from space because are from their property so what to do with the lot of space metalic parts in ranchs and outdoors where nobody knows if is space junk or just junk from the planet. Who knows? NASA?

By: GOZAR

GOZAR — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 00:13:23 +0000

Papphone: “MEPace: ’189.8 degrees east longitude is strange, normally longitude is < 180 :
' ___________ You have them reversed. Latitude: I used to remember it by associating it with the rungs of a ladder … Hence, horizontal." —- No, he has it correct; longitude is EW, latitude is NS. And most of the time we do refer to it as 171 W (instead of 189 E), but mathematically they're equivalent, so it's not uncommon to see both methods in scientific papers.

By: Greggw

Greggw — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 21:56:00 +0000

sarmoon | September 27, 2011, 5:04 pm 5:04 pm ********************* These are old satellites. Newer satellites have rockets to push them to crash in remote areas of the ocean. The size and power of a rocket to push even a small satellite out of Earth’s orbit is huge and unaffordable. There is a huge energy difference between low-Earth orbit and out of Earth orbit.

By: Rek

Rek — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 21:36:54 +0000

From what i’ve read, it did have fuel, though it was used up throughout the years, used to reposition itself or move out of harms way.

By: Pappione

Pappione — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 21:15:43 +0000

Posted by: sarmoon | September 27, 2011, 5:04 pm 5:04 pm … It would take a significant amount of fuel to break away from orbit, and it would also need a navigation system specifically for that to avoid hitting all of the other satellites and existing debris. Good idea though :)

By: sarmoon

sarmoon — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 21:04:18 +0000

One would think they could leave a small booster on the satellite to blast it into the depths of space when it’s service life ended. What’s the need to crash it back to Earth?