With the 24th local time, Russia launched a special military operation in the Donbass region, and Western countries such as the United States, Britain, Japan, and the European Union immediately launched a new round of sanctions against Russia.
The Russian central bank and three commercial banks have all been dismissive of the SANCTIONS imposed on Russia by the United States and the West, but the seemingly unrelated Russian Federal Space Agency's post on social accounts has sent a different message, "If you block cooperation with us, who can stop the out-of-control fall of the International Space Station?" Dmitry Rogozin said.
Russia warned: Sanctions may cause the International Space Station to spiral out of control and fall into Europe and the United States
NASA responded
According to CNN and Newsweek, Dmitry Rogozin, director of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos), warned on Twitter that the sanctions imposed by the United States on Russia on Thursday (24th) could have a serious impact on space.
He said the orbit and position of the International Space Station were controlled by Russian engines. "If cooperation with us is frozen, who can save the ISS so that it doesn't uncontrolled derailment and fall into the U.S. or European territory." The 500-ton device did not fly over Russia. Therefore, all the risks are yours. Are you ready? ”
Screenshot of the head of the Russian Space Agency on social media
Rogozin said the new U.S. sanctions risk "undermining our cooperation on the International Space Station."
It is reported that there are currently four American astronauts, two Russian astronauts and one European astronaut living and working at this orbital outpost.
The US Space Network reported on the 25th that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said that the new sanctions imposed by the United States on Russia will not endanger the operation of the International Space Station. "NASA continues to work with all international partners, including Rossa, to ensure the continued safe operation of the ISS." NASA said that the people-to-people cooperation between the United States and Russia in the field of space, especially on the International Space Station, will continue. "We have no plans to change the agency's support for on-orbit and ground station operations."
The ISS is divided into two parts, the Russian orbital module and the United States orbital module, in cooperation with the United States, Japan, Canada and the European Space Agency.
Former NASA astronaut Garrett Riceman told CNN: "The Russian module cannot work without electricity from the U.S. side, and the U.S. module cannot work without the propulsion system on the Russian side." So you can't break up peacefully. You cannot consciously separate. ”
But British Prime Minister Boris Johnson explicitly questioned the future of the International Space Station in his speech in the House of Commons on Thursday.
Johnson said: "I have been broadly supportive of continued collaboration in the arts and sciences. "But in the current situation, it's hard to see how these situations continue to work."
Screenshot of netizen comments
In the comment section of the news, many netizens said that "Russia is really ready to die." Are the consequences of the out-of-control fall of the International Space Station really unimaginable?
Orbit of the International Space Station
Covers most of the area of human activity
Heavens-Above is a non-profit astronomy website created and operated by Chris Pitt that queries satellite information, satellite orbital roots, satellite transit times, eclipse information, and more. Upstream Xiaobian learned through the website query that due to the rotation of the earth, the orbit of the International Space Station on the surface of the earth projection range is very wide, as of press time, the projection of the space station has passed through Australia, Western Europe and parts of South America, the North American continent will also be located below the projection of the space station at some point, it can be said that most of the human activity area is included in it.
Heavens-Above Orbit of the International Space Station
So the worst-case scenario is that the wreckage of the International Space Station is likely to crash into a densely populated area when it is out of control.
The space station is hollow and covered by the atmosphere
Burning will not cause meteorite damage
Will the runaway Is the International Space Station like a meteorite weighing more than 400 tons, smashing into the ground at a very high speed and bringing about a huge disaster? The actual situation may not be as serious as imagined, for three reasons:
1) The hollow structure of the International Space Station simply cannot be compared with a solid meteorite, causing it to disintegrate rapidly after falling into the atmosphere.
2, the International Space Station uses most of the materials are light metals, most of the mass will be ablated in the atmosphere, only a small number of dense or high-temperature resistant parts can eventually reach the surface of the Earth.
3, the orbital speed of the International Space Station is the first cosmic speed, about 7.9 kilometers per second, in contrast, the speed of meteorites is basically more than ten kilometers per second, and the speed of some meteorites can even reach tens of kilometers per second.
Coupled with the light hollow structure of the International Space Station, the air resistance it encounters as it travels through the atmosphere is much greater than that of meteorites, and the terminal speed is much lower than that of meteorites.
For the above reasons, scientists believe that although the worst case scenario does pose a certain threat to humans, the degree of threat is not as high as imagined.
Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at Harvard University who specializes in objects in and out of low-Earth orbit, gave the answer: The worst-case scenario is equivalent to a plane crashing and crashing in a densely populated area, which is bad, but not as bad as a meteorite hitting Earth.
The International Space Station with Nemo Point
The International Space Station, the largest space platform in orbit, is a space laboratory with modern scientific research equipment, can carry out large-scale, multidisciplinary basic and applied scientific research, jointly built, operated and used by 16 countries, is the largest, longest-consuming and most national space international cooperation project in history.
Since the official construction of the station in 1998, after more than ten years of construction, the construction task was completed in 2010 and transferred to the full use stage. The INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION is mainly operated by NASA, the Russian Federal Space Agency, the European Space Agency, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency.
While the ISS is still in orbit, it is no longer "young", and many of its infrastructure and components are showing signs of aging, so its retirement is already planned, in fact, according to NASA's announcement in early 2022, the ISS will crash in 2031. So how will the INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION crash? Where will it fall? For these questions, scientists have already given answers.
Nemo point
Nemo Point was discovered in 1992 by Canadian survey engineer Lucatella. Nemo Point is the most remote site on the Earth's surface from land, located on the surface of the sea at 48°52.6′S123°23.6′W in the center of the South Pacific (3.150, 0.02, 0.64%), 2688 km away from the nearest land mass. The marine environment around Nemo Point is not enough to support marine life, and only some of the bacteria on the seabed can survive. As a result, it is almost a silent Dead Sea.
But before Nemo Point was discovered and officially named, the vast ocean had long since entered the field of vision and exploited by the former Soviet Union and U.S. space agencies. In 1971, the former Soviet Union searched for a landing point for its abandoned spacecraft, and found nemo point to be the perfect "grave" of spacecraft debris. Because if the spacecraft wreckage falls into this area, its residual radiation and harmful substances will be trapped here and will not flow out, and will not pollute other places.
Since the soviet union first dropped spacecraft wreckage off Nemo Point, more than 260 spacecraft "remains" have rested here, most of which belong to Russia: more than 140 space supply ships, six Salyut space stations, and the Soviet-era Mir space station. In addition, there is a SpaceX rocket; 5 cargo ships of the European Space Agency; and 6 HTV cargo ships of Japan. The International Space Station, the most advanced man-made celestial palace currently in service, is expected to be decommissioned and controlled to fall within 10 years, and its wreckage will also fall into the sea where Nemo Point is located.
Original title:
Russia warns of the consequences of sanctions: Are you ready to watch out for the 500-ton International Space Station crashing into Europe and the United States? NASA responded
Source: Daily Economic News