A National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) spacecraft and a Russian satellite came dangerously close to each other early Wednesday morning, avoiding a potential collision in low Earth orbit, the agency said. .
NASA said early Wednesday that the agency and the U.S. Department of Defense are monitoring an expected flyby between the Thermospheric Magnetospheric Mesospheric Energy and Dynamics Mission (TIMED) U.S. NASA spacecraft and the Russian satellite Cosmos 2221. issued a warning.
NASA said in a news release that both orbiting spacecraft are inoperable and are scheduled to make their closest approach at about 1:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday at an altitude of about 373 miles (600 kilometers).
Late Tuesday morning, NASA announced that the spacecraft and the Russian satellite safely passed each other in orbit around 1:34 a.m. ET. The agency said the TIMED spacecraft continues to function normally.
Artist’s impression of the TIMED spacecraft in orbit above Earth. (NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory)
NASA said it was always expected that the two spacecraft would collide, but that a collision could generate large amounts of debris.
The two spacecraft will once again approach each other, the agency said, but this is the closest their orbits have been predicted to date. The spacecraft and satellite will gradually increase in altitude.
NASA and the Department of Defense continue to monitor the situation.
An artist’s impression of the TIMED spacecraft scanning the Earth in orbit. (Johns Hopkins University APL/Steve Gribben)
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Scientists are becoming increasingly concerned about the growing number of satellites and space debris that could collide with other objects in orbit and pose a hazard, according to Live Science.
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Although a cascade has not yet occurred, the International Space Station in 2022 would have had to quickly move out of the path of debris coming from the Russian satellite Cosmos 1408. Russia destroyed a satellite in a dynamic anti-satellite attack on November 15, 2021.test it Created a cloud of debriscontaining approximately 1,500 pieces of trackable size.
