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TwitterDebris from this week’s satellite collision could circle Earth for up to 10,000 years, threatening many other satellites in an already-crowded area, Russia’s Mission Control chief saidVladimir Solovyov said Tuesday’s smashup of a derelict Russian military satellite and a working U.S. Iridium commercial satellite occurred some 500 miles (800 kilometers) above Earth — the busiest part of near-Earth space.”800 kilometers is a very popular orbit which is used by Earth-tracking and communications satellites,” Solovyov told reporters.
Posts Tagged ‘Orbits’
Space Crash Debris Could Linger 10,000 Years
February 14th, 2009 
admin 
Posted in Tech News 
Tags: Air Traffic Control, Air Traffic Control System, Commercial Satellite, Communications Satellites, Crash Debris, Earth Space, Integral Systems Inc, John Higginbotham, Lanham Maryland, Light Alloys, Maj Gen Alexander, Military Satellite, Orbits, Space Experts, Space Forces, Space Surveillance Network, Speed Impact, Tiny Fragments, Traffic Control System, Vladimir Solovyov 
No Comments »Crash Of US, Russian Satellites A Threat In Space
February 13th, 2009 admin NASA’s Orbital Debris Program Office has counted about 17,000 objects larger than 10 centimeters, and it estimates that there are more than 200,000 particles between one and 10 centimeters. The debris objects shown here are an artist’s impression based on actual density data. The objects are shown at an exaggerated size to make them visible at the scale shown.
Posted in Science News Tags: Christian Science Monitor, Density Data, European Space Agency, Military Communications, Orbital Debris, Orbits, Photos Satellite, Russian Officials, Russian Satellite, Russian Satellites, Russian Spacecraft, Satellite Crash, Satellite Debris, Space Collision, Space Expert, Space Experts, Space Junk, Space Nasa, Unmanned Spacecraft, Yahoo News No Comments »2 Satellites Collide In Space: A First For The Space Program
February 11th, 2009 admin Image from Scientific American2 Big Satellites Collide 500 Miles Over Siberia — Yahoo News/APCAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Two big communications satellites collided in the first-ever crash of two intact spacecraft in orbit, shooting out a pair of massive debris clouds and posing a slight risk to the international space station.NASA said it will take weeks to determine the full magnitude of the crash, which occurred nearly 500 miles over Siberia on Tuesday.”We knew this was going to happen eventually,” said Mark Matney, an orbital debris scientist at Johnson Space Center in Houston.NASA believes any risk to the space station and its three astronauts should be low.
Posted in Science News Tags: Cbs News, Collision Course, Communications Satellites, Debris Clouds, Houston Chronicle, International Space Station, Iridium Phone, Johnson Space Center, Orbital Debris, Orbits, Phone Comm, Program Image, Russian Satellite, Russian Satellites, Satellite Debris, Scientific American, Space Collision, Space Shuttle, Two Satellites, Yahoo News No Comments »East Asia Builds World’s Largest Radio Telescope Network
February 6th, 2009 admin Credit: Landscape photo of the Very Large Array antenna with the moon. Credit: NRAOFrom China View:SHANGHAI, Feb.1 (Xinhua) — East Asian astronomers are building the world’s largest radio telescope array to see the deep into the galaxy and black holes and more accurately determine the orbits of lunar probes such as China’s Chang’e-1.The array, called the East Asia Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) consortium, consists of 19 radio telescopes from China, Japan and the Republic of Korea (ROK) that cover an area with a diameter of 6,000 kilometers from northern Japan’s Hokkaido to western China’s Kunming and Urumqi.The VLBI technology is widely used in radio astronomy. It combines the observations simultaneously made by several telescopes to expand the diameter and increase magnification.Read more ….
Posted in Science News Tags: Array Antenna, Baseline Interferometry, Black Holes, China Japan, East Asia, Hokkaido, Kunming, Landscape Photo, Lunar Probes, Northern Japan, Nrao, Orbits, Radio Astronomy, Radio Telescope Array, Radio Telescopes, Republic Of Korea, Urumqi, Very Large Array, Western China, Xinhua No Comments »Smallest Exoplanet Is Most Earth-like Yet
February 3rd, 2009 admin From Wired News:The smallest exoplanet ever seen is less than twice the size of Earth, and orbits a star similar to our sun. Astronomers recently spotted this world, the most Earth-like planet yet discovered, with the COROT satellite.”For the first time, we have unambiguously detected a planet that is ‘rocky’ in the same sense as our own Earth,” said Malcolm Fridlund, ESA COROT project scientist.For all its similarity to our own globe, though, it is still a far cry away from a habitable Earth-twin.
Posted in Science News Tags: Earth Planet, Exoplanet, Fahrenheit, Far Cry, Globe, Hot, Lava, Malcolm Fridlund, Orbits, Project Scientist, Rocky, Satellite, Scientists, Similarity, Sun, Whips, Wired News No Comments »Super-Neptune Planet Found
January 22nd, 2009 admin This artist’s conception reveals the newly discovered Super-Neptune planet orbiting a star 120 light years away from Earth. Normally blue in color, its red hue is caused by the illumination from the nearby Red Dwarf star. Credit: David A. Aguilar (CfA)Astronomers have discovered a planet somewhat larger and more massive than Neptune orbiting a star 120 light-years from Earth. While Neptune has a diameter 3.8 times that of Earth and a mass 17 times Earth’s, the new world (named HAT-P-11b) is 4.7 times the size of Earth and has 25 Earth masses.HAT-P-11b was discovered because it passes directly in front of its parent star, thereby blocking about 0.4 percent of the star’s light.
Posted in Tech News Tags: Astronomers, Earth Diameter, Earth Masses, Extrasolar Planet, Extrasolar Planets, Harvard Smithsonian Center, Harvard Smithsonian Center For Astrophysics, Keck, Light Years, Neptune Planet, Orbits, Parent Star, Precise Determination, Radial Velocity, Red Dwarf Star, Red Hue, Search Projects, Transit Data, Velocity Data, Wobble No Comments »Sunspot Lapse Exceeds 95% of Normal
January 19th, 2009 admin Above: The solar cycle, 1995-2015. The “noisy” curve traces measured sunspot numbers; the smoothed curves are predictions. Credit: D. Hathaway/NASA/MSFC.From Watts Up With That:Well John Christy gave me a lot to think about in satellite temp trends as far as an improved correction over my last post.
Posted in Science News Tags: Accuracy, Curve, Curves, Endless Cycles, Interesting Things, John Christy, Magnetic Cycles, Nasa, Nasa Msfc, Orbits, Slope, Solar Cycle, Solar Cycles, Solar Scientists, Steve Mcintyre, Sunspot Numbers, Watts No Comments »Dead Stars Harbor Asteroids
January 7th, 2009 admin LONG BEACH, Calif. – New observations of chewed-up asteroids around old dead stars called white dwarfs bolster the idea that the Earth and other rocky planets in our solar system are far from alone in the universe.Astronomers used NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope to peer at six such white dwarf stars and found the signature of asteroid debris circling the stars.
Posted in Tech News Tags: American Astronomical Society, Asteroids, Clumps, Comet Shoemaker Levy, Comet Shoemaker Levy 9, Dead Stars, Dwarf Systems, Orbits, Outer Layers, Outer Planets, Own Solar System, Planets In Our Solar System, Red Giants, Rocky Bodies, Rocky Body, Rocky Planets, Shoemaker Levy 9, Spitzer Space Telescope, White Dwarf Stars, Young Stars No Comments »