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In the brief history of space stations, there have been less than a dozen manned low earth orbit operations. Referencing space stations still makes me think of some sort super villain/ James Bond type thing but I digress. There are only 2 ongoing manned operations right now, the International Space Station and Tiangong 2. Tiangong 1, a formerly inhabited space station, will visit an old friend soon, Earth.
Tiangong-1, meaning “heavenly palace”, was launched in 2011 by the Chinese Space Agency in an attempt to secure a permanent habitant in low earth orbit. For a time, it was successful acting as a base of operations for 3 separate missions but this came to an abrupt halt in September 2016. Chinese officials announced they’ve lost control of the 4th oldest space station in terms of orbit life.
This wouldn’t be the first blunder for the budding young space agency. If you recall, the Chinese Space Agency tested out space missiles on a non-operational satellite without notifying any other space agency. The debris caused by the incident wrecked havoc on all other space operations, manned and otherwise, while also making a terrible debris problem even worse.
With Tiangong-1, it was announced that the wayward base would reenter the earth’s atmosphere in October of 2017 but the time and place of reentry were uncertain given the lack of control. That window was later pushed back between October ’17 to April ’18. Now ESA, the European Space Agency, has given a more specific timeframe, March 29th to April 9th. They also narrowed the reentry locations to between the 43 degree north and the 43 degree south lines.
No one has ever gotten hurt from falling space debris but one person had been hit before. It is predicted that most of the craft won’t survive reentry but a few large chunks will not burn up as they pass through the atmosphere. Keep your eyes to the skies!
