ISS Swerves To Avoid , Russian Space Debris.
CNN reports that on Oct.
24, NASA said that the International Space Station (ISS) had to initiate a five-minute thruster burn to dodge part of Russia's Cosmos 1408 satellite.
CNN reports that on Oct.
24, NASA said that the International Space Station (ISS) had to initiate a five-minute thruster burn to dodge part of Russia's Cosmos 1408 satellite.
Russia destroyed the satellite in a weapons test last year.
CNN reports that about 1,500 pieces of space debris resulted from the satellite's destruction.
At the time, U.S. Space Command condemned Russia's anti-satellite test, referring to it as a "reckless and dangerous act.".
The ISS carried out the recent "Pre-Determined Debris Avoidance Maneuver" to allow for “an extra measure of distance away from the predicted track of a fragment of Russian Cosmos 1408 debris.”.
The thruster firing occurred at 8:25 p.m.
EDT and the maneuver had no impact on station operations.
Without the maneuver, it was predicted that the fragment could have passed within about three miles from the station, NASA, via statement.
NASA reports that the ISS maneuvers to avoid space junk about once per year.
The agency also says that 26,000 pieces of space junk in Earth's orbit are at least the size of a softball.
Over 500,000 pieces are the size of a marble, and “over 100 million pieces are the size of a grain of salt that could puncture a spacesuit.”
