NASA scientists are hoping a bus sized satellite will disintegrate on reentry and people won’t be run down by their dead climate satellite that they presumably used to contribute to the Anthropomorphic Global Warming hysteria. It will land today, but by using the same mathematical skills they employed in the Left’s political ploy to weaken the US and redistribute its’ wealth among developing countries like China, they don’t have a clue as to where to reserve a parking space for their dead orbiting climate change bus.
NASA gained valuable insight and a sense of relief into the parking issue on Thursday, when they decided the bus sized satellite would miss the Western Hemisphere, saving them the hassles of litigation in an LA or NY civil law court. The prospect of a confrontation in a Liberal court that has no tort reform must be frightening to the wizards at NASA.
NASA maintains that predicting a returning satellite’s return, is unlike future climate and weather predictions, in that it is an imprecise science; but like the weather, it will be much easier to predict just before it happens.
The bus sized satellite is expected to disintegrate into 26 pieces of metal scrap; only the largest pieces, in the 300 pound category, will be expected to survive reentry temperatures caused by friction. Since three fourths of the world is water, the odds are in their favor as far as causing injuries and death.
The odds of a human being hit by a piece of space junk is 3,200 to one, considerably better odds than Americans bet against to win lotteries. If you are worried about your own ass and not the rest of the world, the odds improve dramatically to 1 in 21 trillion. Still those old bomb shelters from the 50’s could become useful once again.
NASA takes on the responsibilities of a nanny by warning us not to touch the pieces of a downed satellite, because they could be sharp. See how an ever thoughtful government agency can watch out for its’ people like a benevolent dictator.
Modern satellites are equipped with steering mechanisms and a reserve fuel cell that can put them into a different orbit or careening into the infinite of space or into one of our oceans.
There are approximately 22,000 pieces of junk and satellites orbiting the earth and the possibilities of human injury are much less than a short ride on one of our highways. Reentry predictions are like a government space exploration agency becoming involved in the Anthropogenic Global Warming Scam, they are laughable, unless you are one of the hysterical heavy breathers of the Left. There have been two Russian satellites reenter the atmosphere this year and no one noticed, but NASA in an effort to encourage people to take due diligence and to make headlines, issued a press release. LOL
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Actually, satellite data, if used with integrity, contradicts the hysterical global warming models. Can’t fudge it like tree ring data, or be misled by local effects in the way that surface measurements are affected by urban heat islands.
Incidentally, I would have thought they would have a thruster on a contraption that size, capable of de-orbiting it in a predictable manner, or pushing it further into space.
Heck, I can’t remember the last time our weatherman’s predictions were correct.
I was supposed to be a scorcher.
Looks like rain at any moment in reality.
But they are all warmists.
(I think it is their religion.)
So… how many variables had been stripped out of the prediction model? Was the Sun’s erratic behaviors not factored in the prediction? Was Geothermal and Geological activity assumed to be static? Was the fact the Solar System is about to enter into a section of the Milky Way that’s rich in various cosmic radiation types ranging from Gamma rays to X-ray storms not factored in? Is Asteroid 2004 MN4’s gravity effects on the Earth geology as it passes by in 2029 ignored in this model? Is full out nuclear war between some form of Nation between another or a nuclear terror attack dismissed as a possiblity in their test group?
@Mr. Irons:
Good points, Mr. Irons.
“Clung to space?”
How does a scientist even use words like those?
HUH?
I didn’t know gravity, inertia and all those other forces were fought by desire.
I bet those folks who fell off the World Trade Center on 9-11-01 would have loved to know the secret.
Now go throw out all that stupid, stupid global warming garbage!
Quotes from http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2016295282_apusscifallingsatellite.html
Apparently the satellite has enough rough edges and wings and other arrays hanging off of it to account for it not acting like a rock out there.
So, it will likely crash tonight or tomorrow.
@Nan G: I read that it had “slowed down” and I wondered just who was on the brake pedal!
@Wm T Sherman:
Keeping satellites in orbit is a balancing act. The longer lived craft will have a variety of maneuvering reaction motors and ways to adjust the attitude. Some few will even have larger drive motors, usually also with over-sized attitude/braking motors. (Note: don’t go off the “Russian” satellite in the movie Space Cowboys. In that fictional craft, it was the missile motors that they used to shoot it towards the moon.)
The problem with reentry of a spacecraft not designed to survive reentry, is that there are no flight surfaces for controlling it once it enters the atmosphere. The reaction motors are designed only for minor corrections to orbit and attitude and will have little to no affect on stabilizing the spacecraft during reentry. With uncontrolled descent the buffeting forces and heat generated tend to brake-up the craft but it is impossible to accurately calculate exactly where the pieces will land. Especially on a spacecraft of this size and shape, where the resistance to the atmosphere can vary causing it to drop sooner or later.
Some satellites may still have the final burn stage engine intact, and even some fuel leftover. It is highly unlikely that there will be sufficient fuel to move the spacecraft far enough to to escape earth’s gravity, and the attempt would surely simply put the craft in a hyperbolic and very short-lived ballistic orbit, so all you would likely be able to do is delay the inevitable or cause it to happen sooner. Even if you skip it off the atmosphere, the velocity will be so low that it will still come down. Added to this is the fact that all satellites will have very limited fuel supplies, to limit launch weights. (The heavier it is, the more fuel it takes to put in in space, and every ounce of weight counts.)