It’s becoming more likely that China’s space station known as “Heavenly Palace 1” could play a very serious April Fool’s prank on our planet.
The latest prediction of when the out-of-control spacecraft is likely to slam into Earth’s atmosphere and perhaps make it, in part, all the way to the surface of our planet continues to close in around April 1.
On Saturday the European Space Agency narrowed the range for Tiangong-1’s (its Chinese name) likely re-entry to between March 30 and April 2.
The latest updates from other orbit watchers — including the Center for Orbital and Reentry Debris Studies and academic researchers — have also narrowed the window for Tiangong-1’s entry to somewhere around April 1, plus or minus about four days.
In other words, the 18,740-pound (8,500-kilogram) spacecraft is currently expected to go out in a final blaze of glory sometime between March 28 and April 5.
It’s impossible to predict where it might land, as I explained in a previous post, because it’s likely unsteerable and moving incredibly fast.
It could re-enter anywhere between 43 degrees north and south of the equator, which is a huge swath of land and ocean stretching from the northern contiguous United States to Tasmania in the south. Congratulations, Canada, you’re totally safe except for a little piece of Ontario.
https://www.cnet.com/news/china-space-station-heavenly-palace-tiangong-1-may-crash-march-april/
