A strange Russian satellite disintegrated at the beginning of last month, creating a cloud of debris that may remain in Earth orbit for some time.
The Kosmos 2499 spacecraft was destroyed during the evening of January 3, according to the 18th Space Defense Squadron 18th SDS of the U.S. Space Force, which monitors man-made objects in orbit.
Spacecraft Approaches More Closely
The split generated at least 85 pieces of trackable debris, Monday’s 18th SDS tweet stated Feb. 6. This cloud of space debris is 726 miles 1,169 kilometers above the surface of the Earth, which is so high that it will likely take at least a century for atmospheric drag to pull it down.
The 18th SDS did not speculate on the breakup’s cause. And this is by no means the only mystery surrounding the year Kosmos 2499.
The satellite, together with three other Russian Rockot spacecraft carrying the Rodnik military communications satellites, was put into orbit above the Earth in May 2014, according to Anatoly Zak of RussianSpaceWeb.com.
Zak claimed that Kosmos 2499 was not officially on the launch manifest; U.S. satellite trackers initially cataloged it as Object E, a piece of debris. The debris then proceeded to maneuver, evidently closing in on the Briz-M upper stage of the Rockot.
By the end of October 2014, according to Zak, the United States had officially reclassified Object E from ‘fragment’ to ‘payload’ and cataloged it as Kosmos 2499 with the transliterated name COSMOS 2499. The U.S. military was now rechecking the orbital parameters of the unusual satellite three or four times every day!
Zak claims that on November 9, 2014, Kosmos 2499 passed within 0.47 miles (0.76 kilometers) of the Briz-M. This information comes from orbital element analysis. On November 25, the spacecraft drew even nearer to the rocket body, coming within 0.53 kilometers (0.33 miles).
Such actions prompted conjecture that Kosmos 2499 and Kosmos 2491, two objects that seemed similar and were sent into Earth orbit in December 2013, were testing technology that may enable spacecraft to pursue and possibly disable other satellites.
In December 2014, Oleg Ostapenko, then-head of the Russian government space agency Roscosmos, addressed such rumors at a press conference.
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Results Of Specialized Analysis
Zak said that Ostapenko claimed that Roscosmos and the Russian Academy of Sciences jointly developed the satellites for good causes, such as unnamed educational projects. Without expanding on the specifics of this operation, Ostapenko asserted that they had succeeded in completing their task.
In spite of Ostapenko’s assertions, Kosmos 2499 remained intermittently operational for several more years. According to Zak, a spacecraft that ground measurements indicate was less than 0.3 meters (0.91 feet) broad conducted maneuvers in early 2017.
However, Kosmos 2499’s days of moving are over as the satellite has died. And its demise has added to the already congested environment with additional trash.
According to the European Space Agency, around 36,500 bits of space debris at least 10 centimeters four inches in diameter orbit the Earth. And these are only the items that can be tracked; the Earth’s orbit certainly contains around 130 million objects at least 1 millimeter in diameter.
Even fragments at the smallest end of this size spectrum can cause damage to satellites and other spacecraft, given the velocity of circling objects. For instance, the International Space Station, which orbits the Earth at an average altitude of around 250 miles 400 km, travels at approximately 17,500 mph 28,000 kph.
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