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Seems the space shuttle Discovery’s crew have brought a wave of bad luck with them to the International Space Station (ISS). Moreover, after suffering weather delays and technical glitches ahead of launch, and malfunctioning thrusters and a tricky docking procedure upon arrival, the combined crew now face the perilous threat of wayward space junk.
An Ariane 5. The guilty party according to NASA. Image: NASA.gov.
According to NASA officials, a huge piece of orbiting detritus has caught the watchful eye of mission controllers and is presently being tracked on a trajectory that could potentially see it impacting the orbiting space station.
While the U.S. space administration has not yet labelled the junk as enough of a threat to prevent the current mission’s scheduled space walks to install new equipment aboard the ISS, there is a chance the station’s orbital position may need to be altered via on-board thrusters in the interest of safety.
Speaking on Wednesday, the head of NASA’s flight director office, John McCullough, said the space junk was likely to pass within around two miles of the ISS, an estimation of distance some five miles closer than outlined during initial NASA projections.
Space experts have said the problematic debris is a discarded piece of an Ariane 5 rocket used to carry a satellite into space some three years ago. The junk has proven easy for NASA to spot and track well in advance of its approach due to an estimated surface area of around 200 square metres.
Contrary to common belief, the space immediately beyond our planet is a hotbed of – mainly manmade – orbiting junk from rockets and defunct satellites. According to NASA’s Orbital Debris Program Office, some 19,000 objects of 10 centimetres and above are presently being tracked moving around the Earth.
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