Two dead satellites might collide above the US today

Source: CNN

There is a possibility that two inactive satellites currently in low Earth orbit will collide on Wednesday above the US, according to space debris tracking service LeoLabs. If the two satellites crash into each other, the collision will result in thousands of pieces of small space debris which will pose a massive risk to other satellites in space.

LeoLabs tweeted Monday that astronomers are monitoring the close approach of two decades-old satellites which will come within 13 to 87 meters of each other at 6:39 p.m. EST. There is a 1 in 1,000 chance that the two will collide. While 1 in 1,000 sounds very unlikely, that probability poses an extremely high risk in the space industry. Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, told CNN that the likelihood of the satellites colliding is "extremely alarming." The large size of the satellites combined increases the possibility of a collision, according to LeoLabs.

"It isn't as unlikely as it usually is," McDowell said. "We start getting worried when it's 1 in 10,000, so 1 in 1,000 is unusual and it might actually be a lot worse than that." The two inactive satellites include NASA's IRAS space telescope which was launched in 1983 and the experimental US Naval Research Lab spy satellite GGSE-4, launched in 1967. The satellites will pass by each other Wednesday evening about 559 miles above Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, at nearly 33,000 miles per hour. Since both satellites are dead, astronomers have no way of communicating with them and initiating maneuvers.

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