Two old satellites had an “alarming” chance of colliding in orbit in the skies above the skies on Pittsburgh.
On Monday, LeoLabs, a California company that tracks space debris in low earth orbit, announced it was tracking the two decommissioned spacecraft. It said there was a chance they hit at 6. 41 local time on Wednesday.
One was the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS), a space telescope that was a joint mission between Nasa, the Netherlands and the UK. It ran out of fuel in November .
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The second, GGSE-4, was an experimental US payload launched in May by the US Air Force.
If there had been a collision they could potentially create thousands of pieces of new space debris.
There were many factors at play, so it was difficult to assess whether they could collide or have a relative near miss. It was predicted they would come within (meters) 64 feet) of each other.
The probability of a collision had been higher due to the size of IRAS at 3.6 meters across, and because GGSE has an 29 meter boom deployed.
But a sattelite “ham”, Robert Dixon, reported he had watched as they passed. “No collision seen between the IRAS satellite and GGSE 4. I had perfect viewing conditions and was able to visually observe IRAS, but no collision from what I could tell,” he tweeted.
Analytical Graphics had a simulation of the two satellites approaching each other more than miles above Pennsylvania.
On Wednesday morning LeoLabs tweeted: “Though it is still unlikely that these objects will collide, we have tasked our radars to schedule longer duration tracking on both objects following the event to search for evidence of any new debris (and hopefully not find any!) ”
The company also said: “Events like this highlight the need for responsible, timely deorbiting of satellites for space sustainability moving forward.”
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