A Chinese rocket is coming back to the planet earth, and it weighs 21 tons. The spacecraft lost control of the speed and could land anywhere in the world.
Experts said the spacecraft is plummeting to the land of earth. There is no certainty about its landing spot. It could hit anywhere in the world, even in populated areas.
China declared on Thursday that they launched the spacecraft from base station Tianhe successfully. It is a module of their new space base, which China is building.
Spacecraft Long March (5B)’s length is 100 ft and width is 16 ft. It was supposed to come back to its specific spot in the ocean as several booster spacecraft do. Long March made into orbit and plummeted till now.
Experts said that the spacecraft is coming back to the earth’s land with no control of speed. There is no exact calculation of where it will ultimately land.
There are assumptions that the rocket would land in any of the oceans as earth consists mostly of oceans. However, it could hurtle to any inhabited area too. The land could be anywhere from the USA’s New York, which is under the northern hemisphere. It also can hit New Zealand’s Wellington, which comes under southern.
Speed of the Chinese rocket is up to 5 miles per one second
The rocket is currently rounding the earth with 90 minutes of interval. The speed of it is 5 miles in one second. It is coming more closer with every lap around the earth. Scientists are failing to calculate the specific spot where it could land. A simple error in the calculation of seconds is going to make a difference in countless miles.
Earlier last year, NASA criticized China for launching their Long March ( 5B). It also came back to earth with no control of speed.
China repeated the same action, not altering the previous mistake
The rocket could have landed in the USA but missed it with 15 minutes of difference only. The speed of that rocket was so fast that it ultimately went to Africa’s Cote d’Ivoire, far away from the United States.
Jonathan McDowell, the astronomer, said that there is a particular restriction from 1990. It suggested that nothing which weighs more than 10 ton is permissible to come back into the earth. McDowell works to track space debris.
He informed SpaceNews that he expected that China would make changes in this rocket and their future rockets after the last year’s fiasco. It seems China did not take account of uncontrolled speed even at this time.
He added that this action is unacceptable as it must not happen time and again. The speed is uncontrollable, and with such speed, anything disastrous can take place.
Weight of the Chinese rocket may decrease before entering earth
Although there is a high probability that when the rocket enters the earth, the weight could decrease. The reason behind such a thing is that it consists of a few components which could get burnt. However, the motors would still be intact and hit the land of earth.
McDowell said that it is hard to evaluate the actual weight of the rocket and how many fragments would be ultimately coming to the land. There is no knowledge to them about the actual blueprint of the spacecraft. The general principle is that the amount of dry mass should vary between 20% to 40% on average.
The US monitoring the land of uncontrolled Chinese rocket
The US has made a Space Force that is meant to monitor the current situation. The rocket could give only two hours or even less warning time before landing. The speed is over 15,000 miles per hour. The US will only have that much time to figure out the exact landing spot of the Chinese spacecraft.
