As of 9:30 p.m. EDT Sept. 22, 2011, the orbit of UARS was 110 mi by 115 mi (175 km by 185 km). Re-entry is possible sometime during the afternoon or early evening of Sept. 23, Eastern Daylight Time. The satellite will not be passing over North America during that time period. It is still too early to predict the time and location of re-entry with any more certainty, but predictions will become more refined in the next 24 hours.
Have you ever wanted a mid-morning snack and heard the sudden crack of a sonic boom only to look up and see a 6 ton flaming satellite careening towards your house at terminal velocity?
Yeah, me neither.
But it looks like one lucky winner just might experience this later today.
The sky is falling– literally.
It turns out Ronald Reagan was right all along. We really do need a series of satellites to shoot down threats from space before they do damage to the American people. As it turns out, we didn’t need that to protect against Russian ICBMs. We needed it as protection from our own space junk.
See that crater over there?
— Yeah.
That was Joe Johnson’s house.
— Really? What happened? All I see is a pond with a chimney sticking out of it.
Satellite fell on him.
— Huh.
Question: If a satellite falls on your house do you get to keep it?
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