NASA's Swift satellite telescope heads for fiery re-entry 22 years after launch
NASA's Swift satellite telescope is set to burn up in Earth's atmosphere after 22 years of service. A recent mission by startup Katalyst to rescue and boost the satellite failed, marking a setback for orbital maintenance technology.
Why it matters
The failure of the rescue mission highlights the technical challenges of orbital servicing, a field considered critical for the future of space exploration and military satellite operations.
An aging NASA satellite telescope that a robotic spacecraft was sent to retrieve on a failed rescue mission this summer was headed for a fiery re-entry into Earth's atmosphere early on Wednesday, nearly 22 years after it was launched into orbit.
The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, weighing roughly 3,200 pounds (1,452 kg), was expected to tumble out of orbit and burn up in the atmosphere at about 3:30 a.m. EST (0830 GMT), with fragments surviving re-entry unlikely to threaten populated areas, according to NASA.
The US Space Force has put the odds of harm coming to anyone on Earth at one chance in 2,100, NASA said in an online statement.
NASA's prized $500 million Swift satellite, a first-of-its-kind multi-wavelength space observatory, has been studying gamma-ray bursts and other cosmic phenomena since 2004, using its array of three telescopes.
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