{"id":18587,"date":"2018-03-30T21:15:43","date_gmt":"2018-03-30T13:15:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/no-fooling-skywatchers-zero-in-on-fiery-fall-of-chinas-tiangong-1-space-lab\/"},"modified":"2018-03-30T21:15:43","modified_gmt":"2018-03-30T13:15:43","slug":"no-fooling-skywatchers-zero-in-on-fiery-fall-of-chinas-tiangong-1-space-lab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/no-fooling-skywatchers-zero-in-on-fiery-fall-of-chinas-tiangong-1-space-lab\/","title":{"rendered":"No fooling: Skywatchers zero in on fiery fall of China\u2019s Tiangong-1 space lab"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_408091\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-408091\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full-width wp-image-408091\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-tiangong2-630x517.jpg\" alt=\"Tiangong-1\" width=\"630\" height=\"517\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-tiangong2-630x517.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-tiangong2-768x630.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-tiangong2.jpg 962w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-408091\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An artist\u2019s conception shows China\u2019s Tiangong-1 space lab flying over the Gulf of Mexico. (The Aerospace Corp. via YouTube)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>After months of tracking China\u2019s uncontrollable Tiangong-1 space lab, satellite watchers have narrowed down the time frame for its final, fiery plunge through the atmosphere&nbsp;\u2014 and it\u2019s this weekend.<\/p>\n<p>Here are a few of the current predictions:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>European Space Agency:<\/strong>&nbsp;April 1, 6 p.m. PT \u00b1 2 hours. (April 2, 01:00 GMT, which is seven hours ahead of Pacific Daylight Time)<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Aerospace Corp.:<\/strong> April 1, 5:30 p.m. PT&nbsp;\u00b1 1.7 hours. (April 2, 00:30 GMT)<\/li>\n<li><strong>China Manned Space:<\/strong> April 2, Beijing time. (15 hours ahead of PT)<\/li>\n<li><strong>SatTrackCam:<\/strong> April 1 at 5:52 p.m. PT \u00b1 130 minutes. (April 2, 00:52 GMT)<\/li>\n<li><strong>Joint Space Operations Center:<\/strong>&nbsp;April 1 at 5:48 p.m. PT \u00b1 2 hours. (April 2, 00:48 GMT)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The latest predictions are about half a day later than they were earlier in the week, largely because an expected solar storm didn\u2019t sweep past Earth. \u201cThis means that the density of the upper atmosphere, through which Tiangong-1 is moving, did&nbsp;<em>not&nbsp;<\/em>increase as predicted (which would have dragged the spacecraft down sooner),\u201d ESA explained.<\/p>\n<p>Where will it fall? Nobody knows, precisely. But experts have mapped out a large zone where it <em>won\u2019t<\/em> fall&nbsp;\u2014 and it won\u2019t fall anywhere close to Seattle. The reason experts can be so sure is that when Tiangong-1 was launched in 2011, it was put in a specific orbital inclination that strays only so far from the equator: 42.8 degrees latitude, north and south.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_408110\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-408110\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-408110 size-full-width\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-reentry-630x231.png\" alt=\"Re-entry zone\" width=\"630\" height=\"231\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-reentry-630x231.png 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-reentry-768x281.png 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/180328-reentry.png 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-408110\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The central map shows the potential re-entry zone for China\u2019s Tiangong-1 space lab. The graph on the left tracks population distribution, while the graph on the right shows the probability that the re-entry will occur at a given latitude, based on Tiangong-1\u2019s orbit. Click on the image for a larger version. (ESA Graphic)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Seattle is beyond that territory, along with the rest of the northern tier of the U.S., plus Alaska, Canada, northern Europe and Russia. You\u2019d have to drive almost as far south as Grants Pass, Ore., to reach the potential re-entry zone. (<strong>Update for April 1<\/strong>: The final orbital tracks show that Tiangong-1 won\u2019t fall anywhere near North America.)<\/p>\n<p>Put the emphasis on \u201cpotential\u201d: As with other cases of uncontrolled re-entry, the chances are great that Tiangong-1\u2019s space junk will blaze through the skies over one of the world\u2019s oceans, just because that accounts for most of the zone\u2019s area.<\/p>\n<p>But not all of the area. The possibility that debris from the space lab will fall on a populated area has been stoking headlines for days. If that\u2019s what you\u2019re worried about, don\u2019t overstress: The chances of being injured by space debris are astronomically small&nbsp;\u2014 less than 1 in a trillion, by some estimates.&nbsp;And as previously noted, the chances are zero outside the potential re-entry zone.<\/p>\n<p>Only one person has ever reported being hit by orbital debris: That\u2019s Lottie Williams of Tulsa, Okla., who said in 1997 that she was struck a glancing blow by a 6-inch metal fragment later traced to a Delta rocket stage. Even then, she wasn\u2019t injured.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Following the Tiangong-1 Reentry\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/C0GBlCJCkr0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\" data-ratio=\"0.5625\" data-width=\"800\" data-height=\"450\" style=\"display: block; margin: 0px; width: 800px; height: 450px;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The coordinates for Tiangong-1\u2019s demise are uncertain because the abandoned lab\u2019s Chinese controllers lost contact with it in 2016, three years after it was last occupied. That means the lab\u2019s descent is subject to the vagaries of atmospheric drag rather than a precisely planned series of commanded thruster firings. That\u2019s the preferred way to bring a spacecraft down.<\/p>\n<p>Tiangong-2, a successor space lab that China launched in 2016, is still going strong.<\/p>\n<p>In terms of tonnage, Tiangong-1 isn\u2019t even close to the largest piece of hardware to fall from the sky. That honor goes to Russia\u2019s 120-ton Mir space station, which made a controlled descent in 2001. The biggest object to make a less than fully controlled fall was NASA\u2019s 74-ton Skylab station, which littered debris over Australia in 1979.<\/p>\n<p>Tiangong-1, which weighed 8.5 tons when it was launched with a topped-off tank of fuel, is more on a par with the European Space Agency\u2019s 12-ton ATV or Japan\u2019s 10-ton HTV space transports.<\/p>\n<p>The most likely effect of Tiangong-1\u2019s re-entry will be to put on a shooting-star show, as was the case with ATV and HTV re-entries. The only question is whether anyone will be in the vicinity to see it. By Monday, we\u2019ll know.<\/p>\n<p><em>This report was originally published at 1:25 p.m. PT March 28, and last updated at 2:54 p.m. PT April 1.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An artist\u2019s conception shows China\u2019s Tiangong-1 space lab flying over the Gulf of Mexico. (The Aerospace Corp. via YouTube) After months of tracking China\u2019s uncontrollable Tiangong-1 space lab, satellite watchers have narrowed down the time frame for its final, fiery plunge through the atmosphere&nbsp;\u2014 and it\u2019s this weekend. Here are a few of the current [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[135,4180,3000],"class_list":["post-18587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-china","tag-space-junk","tag-tiangong-1"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18587"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18587\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}