This is the Kosmos 482 probe

space initiatives that involve the launch of satellites in Spain have gained a lot of traction. The recent Spanish Spainsat NG1 satellites or the futuristic duo of Paz II observation satellites are just some examples of this, and aspire to revolutionize the immediate future of space scientific technology. The problem is that some of these initiatives They suppose a certain threat, since sometimes they end up falling to the earth, being able to cause great damage. In the second week of May, one of these satellites will fall: an landing module from the 70s of the Soviet Union.

Talk later of the Kosmos 482 Russian, A space probe launched on March 31, 1972 in the middle of the USSR. The idea was that this mission landed in Venus and could explore the planet, mainly due to the space race that the Soviet block carried out against the United States. In fact, the ultimate goal of Kosmos 482 was to get to Venus before the United States, which led to the Venera program. Unfortunately, the mission was not successful.

And the Kosmos 482 probe could not reach the necessary trajectory to reach Venus, despite reaching the parking orbit successfully planned. After their failure, part of the payload and the bearer ship fell into the terrestrial orbit, qualifying as a space garbage by the Soviet Union. It is the remaining pieces of the mission that Dutch scientist Marco Langbroek says they will fall on Earth next week.

A Russian probe will fall on earth

This has been detailed by Langbroek in his blog Saving cam suffer, that collects the findings of the satellite monitoring station of the expert in the Netherlands. The object in question It is the landing module of the Soviet Mission Venera, wrapped in a protective semiiglobular titanium housing, prepared to protect the venus atmosphere probe in its hypothetical entry to the atmosphere of said planet. This, in the eyes of Langbroek, would allow the Kosmos 482 Survive, at least in theory, to re -entry into the Earth’s atmosphere and its impact.

“The risks are not particularly high, but neither nulls,” writes the scientist in the blog. Kosmos 482 (or rather, what remains of it) has a mass of just under 500 kilos, with a size of one meter, which represents similar risks “to those of the impact of a meteorite.” Using a tudat reentry analysis, Langbroek estimates that in the impact it will achieve a speed of between 65 and 70 meters per second, or what is the same, 242 kilometers per hour in case it does not fragmented or disintegrate during the reentry.

The biggest problem regarding this situation is that the penetrated will be totally uncontrolled, So it is impossible to determine or when it will fall, or where the impact will occur. “The reentry can occur at any point between latitudes 52 N and 52 S. According to our current model, it should happen About May 10 […] With a few days of margin. Thus, the margin of impact is reflected in the second week of May.

It all started on March 31, 1972, when the USSR was able to launch the Kosmos 482 probe rocket from the Baikonur cosmodrome. Kosmos 482 reached the desired orbit of 196 by 1215 kilometers, so the Russians hoped to achieve a fruitful trajectory towards Venus. It could not be due to a bad configuration in the timer of the probe, which caused the automatic system of the rocket stage Blok L It would detach too soon for a failure of the automatic system.

The ignition, which was expected to last four minutes, lasted only two. Not having the necessary propulsion, the probe could not abandon the land orbit at the cost of the action of the gravity of the Earth. Part of the mission was trapped in that orbit, which caused two days later part of it to fall in New Zealand. Another part, the payload and the landing module, reaching an upper orbit of 9,805 kilometers of apogee and 205 perigee. The one that was expected to be his sister probe, Venera 8, did have the expected success.

And why Kosmos 482 could this re -entry resist on earth? The 500 kilos landing module was specifically designed to resist forces up to 300 g of acceleration, In addition to being able to withstand 105 bars pressures. Recall that this probe was destined to perch on Venus, a planet with very hard conditions. It remains to be seen if this re -entry causes serious problems in its impact.