Space Debris Heads to the ISS, which Swerves Out of the Way — That was Close! - The Cosmic Companion 13 Nov. 2021
Two pieces of space debris were planning on playing it "too close for comfort" with the International Space Station - fire up the engines!
Space debris sent the International Space Station is sent into a higher orbit Wednesday, missing a close encounter with wayward detritus.
The International Space Station (ISS) was forced into a higher orbit on 10 November, as debris closed in on the orbiting outpost. Calculated orbits for the space junk showed a close approach within 600 meters (less than 2,000 feet) of the ISS coming on 12 November, necessitating raising the orbit of the space station.
This maneuver, the 29th such event for the orbiting outpost, also placed the ISS at an altitude favored for the arrival of a pair of Russian spacecraft. Traces of air found high above Earth create atmospheric drag, requiring periodic adjustment.
“The avoidance maneuver was calculated by ballistics specialists of the Flight Control Center at TsNIImash (part of Roscosmos), which allowed cancelling the November 16 orbit adjustment,” the Russian space agency Roscosmos reported.
This was the first repositioning of the ISS since 12 October, moving the orbiting outpost from around 418 km (260 miles) above our planet to an altitude of 438.4 km (272.4 miles).
Read more: https://bit.ly/Space-Debris-ISS
Coming Up on Astronomy News with The Cosmic Companion
16 November: Vacation – No show (or newsletter!)
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23 November (s5/e19): Asteroid Close-Up with NASA’s Psyche Mission to the Asteroid Belt, shooting asteroids in space with the DART mission, featuring Bill Bottke. Director of Space Studies at the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) talking about Psyche, and Esen Ercan Alp of Argonne National Laboratory on studying samples from the asteroid Ryugu.
30 November (s5/e20): Matthew Bothwell talks about his new book, The Invisible Universe. He’ll tell us about the Universe we can’t see with our eyes.
7 December (s5/e21): Dr. Sylvia Earle, one of the world’s top experts on ocean science and conservation, shares her inspiring wisdom in National Geographic Ocean: A Global Odyssey
14 December (s5/e22): Mark McCaughrean, Senior Advisor for Science & Exploration at the European Space Agency, talks about the BepiColumbo mission to Mercury.
21 December (s5/e23): Season Finale: James Webb Special with Stefanie Milam, Webb Telescope Deputy Project Scientist For Planetary Science
28 December: Happy Holidays! (No show)
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