What weighs 6 tons and is as big as a bus? The piece of satellite, the UARS (Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite), NASA expected to plummet to Earth back in late September. “All, or nearly all parts of the 20-year-old dead satellite safely plunged into the Pacific Ocean, likely missing land and taking refuge in the ocean,” reports NASA officials. The UARS was launched in 1991 and after gas supplies were exhausted in 2005, the satellite was retired and a new satellite was launched. Weather officials report pieces have hit land or sea, there was a 1 in 32,000 chance of hitting a human. “Pieces are falling off of this flaming fire ball, and some of it has enough momentum to go hundreds of miles,” said Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. If the pieces hit human, land, or sea there are two major players in the world that are going unnoticed and are also being affected by this ‘falling, dead satellite'. Animals and the environment are being affected by this hunk of metal. With the majority of the pieces falling into the ocean, marine life will be taking another burden from the human race. These satellite shards supposedly have no radiation, but can disturb the ecosystems of the world under water. NASA officials have also stated: “The good news is that UARS (fallen satellite) will probably splatter into the open ocean, because Earth is a water planet. And humans, for all their sprawl, occupy a very limited portion of its surface.” Congratulations for humans, short stick once again for animals and the environment. Before research had been done on the re-entry of the satellite into the atmosphere, other NASA satellites were launched into space. This will likely result in the same type of re-entry into the Earth's realm as previous crashing down space-litter. Other reports of satellites hitting the Earth include Western Australia in 1979, but there is a guesstimate that orbital debris hits Earth about once a year continuously. Only time will tell to what price the marine life and environment are taking for this fallen debris. BM
