Spaceship graveyard: where all space debris falls from orbit. Cemetery of spaceships, or where does space debris fall

In the Spaceship Graveyard

The farthest point on Earth from land has many names, but most often it is called Point Nemo, or the oceanic pole of inaccessibility. It is located at 48°52.6 south latitude and 123°23.6 west longitude. The nearest island of land is located about 2250 kilometers from here. Due to its remoteness, this place is ideal for the disposal of spacecraft, and therefore space agencies often refer to it as the "spaceship graveyard".

This place is located in the Pacific Ocean and is the most distant point on our planet from any human civilization.

The wreckage of the station "Mir"

However, Bill Aylor, an aerospace engineer and re-entry specialist, has a different definition for this place:

"This is the best place on the planet to drop something from space without causing third-party damage."

To "bury" the next spacecraft in this cemetery, space agencies need some time to make the necessary calculations. As a rule, more compact satellites do not end their lives at point Nemo, because, NASA explains, “the heat created by atmospheric friction, to a greater extent, destroys a satellite falling at a speed of several thousand kilometers per hour even before it falls. TA-dah! It's like magic. As if there was no satellite!

Larger objects like Tiangong-1, China's first orbital space station, launched in September 2011 and weighing around 8.5 tons, are quite another matter. China lost control of the 12-meter orbital laboratory in March 2016. Forecasts are disappointing. The station should fall to Earth sometime in early 2018. Where exactly? So far no one knows. The same Aylor, who works for the nonprofit Aerospace Corporation, says his company likely won't make predictions until five days before the station is expected to collapse in Earth's atmosphere. When that happens, hundreds of kilograms of various metal parts like the station's titanium skin, fuel tanks, and more will continue to fall at over 300 kilometers per hour until they eventually hit the planet's surface.

Since China has lost control of the Tiangong-1 station, the country cannot confidently predict whether it will fall into Point Nemo.

Junkyard of spaceships

Interestingly, astronauts living aboard the International Space Station are, in fact, closest to this very point Nemo. The thing is that the ISS is circling over the Earth (and in particular over the place we are talking about) at an altitude of about 400 kilometers, while the piece of land closest to Point Nemo is much further away.

From 1971 to mid-2016, space agencies from around the world buried at least 260 spacecraft here, according to Popular Science. At the same time, as the Gizmodo portal notes, the number of disposed spacecraft has increased dramatically since 2015, when their total number was only 161 at that time.

Here, at a depth of more than three kilometers, the Soviet space station "Mir", more than 140 Russian cargo spacecraft, several trucks of the European Space Agency (for example, the first automatic cargo ship "Jules Verne" of the ATV series) and even one of the rockets SpaceX, according to reports from Smithsonian.com. True, the spacecraft here can hardly be called neatly stacked in one heap. Aylor notes that objects as large as the Tangun-1 station can break apart when they fall, covering an area of ​​​​1,600 kilometers along and several dozen across. The very same territory of "alienation" of Nemo's point covers an area of ​​​​more than 17 million square kilometers, so finding a specific fallen spacecraft here is not so easy as it might seem at first glance.

The European Space Agency's Jules Verne cargo ship breaks apart on re-entry. September 29, 2008

Of course, not all spacecraft end up in this space technology graveyard, but the chances that a part of a collapsing spacecraft will fall on one of the people, regardless of where this spacecraft will fall to Earth, are very small, Aylor notes.

“Of course, nothing is impossible. However, since the beginning of the space age, the last incident that comes to mind occurred already in 1997. Then in Oklahoma, an unburned part of a rocket fell on a woman, ” Aylor explains.

The same unburned piece of rocket and the woman it fell on

A dead spacecraft can create a much greater danger in orbit.

The real threat of space debris

At the moment, about 4,000 artificial satellites are circling the Earth at various altitudes. And there should be more in the near future. In other words, orbit is still full of various spacecraft, and soon there will be no crowding at all.

According to statistics from Space-Track.org, in addition to satellites, there are thousands of uncontrolled rocket remains in orbit, as well as more than 12,000 other man-made objects larger than a human fist. And this is if you omit countless different screws, bolts, pieces of dried paint (from rocket skins) and many metal particles.

“Over time, countries began to realize that they were literally littering space and this posed a serious threat not only to their systems, but to everyone in general” Ailor adds.

The worst, according to experts from the same European Space Agency, can happen when two pieces of space debris collide with each other, especially when these objects are large.

Random collisions of the same satellites, although very rare, do occur. The last such incidents were in 1996, 2009 and two in 2013. As a result of such events, as well as as a result of the deliberate destruction of satellites, a huge amount of space debris appears, posing a threat to other working satellites and the danger of a chain effect.

"We have found that this debris can remain in orbit for hundreds of years," Aylor comments.

To prevent the emergence of new space debris, aging spacecraft must be deorbited over time. Many space agencies, as well as private space companies, are now considering building a dedicated scavenger spacecraft that could capture obsolete satellites and other spacecraft and send them straight to an underwater spacecraft graveyard on Earth.

However, the same Aylor, like some other experts, insists on the development of new technologies and methods with which it will be possible to capture, drag and remove old uncontrolled space debris that has accumulated in orbit and poses a real threat.

“I proposed something like XPRIZE and the Grand Challenge, where it would be possible to select the concepts of the three most suitable spacecraft and give grants for their development and subsequent use in cleaning up the planet’s orbit,” Ailor says.

Unfortunately, technical difficulties in the implementation of such plans are far from being in the first place among the problems when there is such a thing as bureaucracy.

“Technical difficulties are far from the main thing here. The main problem here is the idea of ​​private property. For example, no other nation has the right to touch the same American satellites. If something like this happens, it could be calculated as an act of military aggression.” Aylor explains.

According to Aylor, in the face of a common threat, the nations of the whole world should unite, because only in this way can such problems be effectively solved.

Like any other machines, space satellites and stations do not last forever - whether their job is to collect climate data, provide communications or conduct research operations, they eventually become obsolete and break down just like ordinary vacuum cleaners or washing machines. cars. When this happens, they fall to the ground, but where is the graveyard of the dead spaceships?

The fall of such devices is controlled by man, and most of the "dying" satellites are, oddly enough, in one place in the world, which is mysteriously called Point Nemo. This mass grave site for obsolete spacecraft is closest to New Zealand and Argentina, according to NASA officials, but in reality is the most remote point in the world from any settlement. And, of course, Point Nemo is just a section of the oceans, or rather, the Pacific. Also called the "Oceanic Pole of Inaccessibility" and the "Uninhabited Area of ​​the Pacific", this graveyard of lost satellites is located approximately 4,000 km from the nearest landmass. Its exact coordinates are also known - 48 degrees 52.6 minutes south latitude and 123 degrees 23.6 minutes west longitude.

These are great depths (about 3 km), which are mainly inhabited by sponges, whales, perches and octopuses. Probably, these dark sea waters envelop the spaceships that fell into them with the same blue veil as the space of space.

And as mentioned above, the fall of spacecraft into Point Nemo is closely watched. In order for the satellite to “retire” where it is needed, space agencies must manage this process, removing the “dying” device from orbit in time. Small satellites, of course, do not reach the earth, being destroyed in the atmosphere. But the larger ones and initially located in low orbits do not burn out completely, and their remnants fall into Point Nemo.

According to official figures, between 1971 and mid-2016, global space agencies sent something like 260 spacecraft to the “uninhabited Pacific Ocean”. These included 4 HTV cargo ships belonging to Japan, 5 ESA automatic cargo ships, 140 Russian transport ships and satellites, including the Mir station (in 2001), several cargo ships of the European Space Agency, and even one SpaceX rocket .

Sometimes, however, there are failures. In particular, the 8.5-ton Chinese space station Tiangong-1, launched in 2011, got out of control of the Chinese agency in March 2016 and is now lost somewhere in the depths of space. It is assumed that at the end of 2017-beginning of 2018, it will clearly decide to fall to the ground, starting to decline at a speed of 290 km/h. And she's unlikely to hit Nemo's Point. But, according to experts, one should not be afraid of the fall of such a bulk in the middle of our field or city.

“Most parts of space stations and satellites burn up during the fall. For example, after passing through all layers of the atmosphere, only 20 tons remained from the huge 143-ton Mir station,” they reassure.

And it seems that their words are indeed true, because in the entire space race of mankind, only one case has been recorded when a person was injured, and even then extremely slightly, from the fall of a part of an apparatus that arrived from space. The man was a woman from Oklahoma, walking along a dirt path in the middle of the endless cornfields of the American state. In fact, a small piece of the satellite had just grazed her shoulder, mostly frightening her rather than hurting her physically.

However, Point Nemo is not the only place "rest of the dead spaceships." In fact, there are two such places, and the second is far in space. Back in 1993, all the space agencies of the world agreed on common rules for the disposal of dead vehicles either in the "water grave" of the Pacific Ocean, or in the so-called "graveyard orbit", located far from the Earth. It is located approximately 36,000 km above the earth and 322 km from the nearest operating satellites and stations. And this method of disposal of obsolete devices is preferred to be used much more often.

The practical benefits of space exploration are undeniable. This includes satellite television and radio broadcasting, the global Internet, weather forecasts, and the study of the Earth's biosphere. The other side of the issue is the pollution of near-Earth and terrestrial space with space debris. Previously, the wreckage of spaceships fell to Earth, anywhere. But with the development of the space industry, the question arose of finding a safe place to bury the remains of spacecraft. And the place was found - this is a cemetery of spaceships, located in the Pacific Ocean, where they are drowned by all the space agencies of the world.

The result of computer simulation

When the development of astronautics reached a certain size, the question arose of a place where it would be possible to place the remains of spacecraft without harming the biosphere and far enough from human habitation.

Croatian engineer Hrvoje Lukatela in 1992, through the development of a computer model, determined a place that meets the given parameters. He also suggested calling it, which later became a cemetery of spaceships, Nemo point - the name of the hermit of mankind from a fantastic story by Jules Verne.

point in the ocean

The most distant place from people turned out to be a point in the South Pacific Ocean, from which the nearest uninhabited islands - Dusi Atoll and Motu Nui Island (Easter Island) - are 2688 kilometers away. At 470 kilometers from Duci Atoll is the nearest inhabited island of Pitcairn with 49 inhabitants.

Point Nemo and the oceanic pole of inaccessibility are the names of the spacecraft graveyard, whose coordinates are 48 degrees south latitude and 123 degrees west longitude. Ships do not go here, planes do not fly, and people are very far away.

Environmental aspect

Point Nemo is also called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This is due to the presence here of the great circulation - a large annular current, like a funnel, drawing into its center all the debris of nearby waters. This strong current did not allow the rich plant and animal life to develop here and turned this place into a kind of desert at a depth of 4 kilometers in the ocean.

Ecologists admit that the decision to make a cemetery of spaceships here brings the least harm to the world's oceans. But to say that there are no negative consequences at all, it is impossible. After all, no one has canceled the damage to the ozone layer and the pollution of the atmosphere by combustion products.

Why do we need it?

Unfortunately, modern spacecraft are not designed for reusable use. There are exceptions (Shuttle, Dragon, Falcon), but they are expensive, few in number, and heavily damaged upon return to Earth. Basically, when the margin of safety, technological capabilities and the life of the spacecraft are exhausted, there are two ways to remove it from orbit. The first is to send to the spaceship graveyard in the Pacific Ocean. The second is to send it to a distant orbit hundreds of kilometers from the orbits of controlled satellites.

Small objects with an orbit close to the Earth are more profitable to send to the atmosphere of the planet, where it will burn out almost without a trace. In the case of a large satellite, its chances of burning out completely are minimal, and then careful planning is required for its decommissioning and a place where the remains will fall safely.

grand landfill

Today, about 260 objects from outer space are buried in the spacecraft cemetery. Most of all there are unmanned trucks that returned from the International Space Station. And it, too, will become a submerged space station, according to forecasts, around 2028.

But if the reader imagines this place as a site where the flooded space stations and satellites lie, then this is not entirely true. Even if everything is planned and calculated, the object will never make a complete landing, the error will always be present. Its small charred fragments are scattered over hundreds of kilometers, and that is why vast territories are required for the burial of spacecraft.

The most impressive funeral

This happened on the evening of March 23, 2001, when the Russian Mir station was deorbited and sunk in these waters. She served 15 years and weighed 135 tons. At a 100-kilometer altitude, the batteries separated from the station, at an altitude of 90 kilometers it fell apart into several parts, the flames from the burning of which were seen even by the inhabitants of the island of Fiji.

About 25 tons of the station's metal flew to the waters of the ocean. The trail from the fall of debris and debris was 1.5 kilometers long and up to 100 kilometers wide. Residents of Australia, the Fiji Islands and Japan were then recommended to take refuge in shelters, but many even drew landmarks on their lawns and hoped that the Russian station would fall into their yard.

Flooding errors

There were also dangerous cases with the burial of spacecraft. So, in 1979, something went wrong with the American space station Skylab and its remains fell into the western part of Australia. The situation repeated itself in 1991, but with the Russian Salyut-7 station. Its wreckage fell in Argentina. Fortunately, in both cases it happened in sparsely populated areas, there were no casualties or destruction.

Not only on Earth

Recently, images of the planet Mars made by the Curiousity rover and orbital probes have appeared in the press. They clearly show craters on the surface of the red planet. There is a version that they are formed from engines during the landing and takeoff of alien ships. Ufologists claim that this is a cemetery of spaceships and a repair site for civilizations unknown to us.

Green way out - "Liquidator"

By 2025, the Roskosmos agency promises to launch an autonomous apparatus called Likvidator into the geostationary orbit of the planet. Its task will be to clean up the remains of aircraft and other debris from orbit.

"Space cleaner" will cost about 11 billion rubles, weigh 4 tons and be operated for 10 years. The project considers two options for the disposal of space debris - its launch into higher orbits and its flooding in the Pacific Ocean at the spacecraft graveyard. Ecologists are for the first option, although it is not perfect. It will simply push the solution to the space clutter problem into the future.

If earlier few people thought about where the remnants of spacecraft that did not burn out in the atmosphere go, now the reader knows the answer to the question of where the cemetery of spaceships on Earth is located - at point Nemo in the depths of the Pacific Ocean.

The problem of disposal of space debris is growing in scope, environmentalists and space researchers are looking for a way to minimize the damage to the biosphere of our home from the consequences of space exploration. I would like to believe that in the near future these ideas will turn into reality, and we will be able to leave our descendants a flourishing and prosperous planet without spacecraft cemeteries on its surface.

This report is available in high definition.

In the Pacific Ocean there is a unique natural formation - the Truk (or Chuuk) lagoon. About 10 million years ago there was a large island here, but over time it sank under water.

During the Second World War, the islands around the lagoon housed a large naval military base in Japan, as well as an airfield. In 1944, ships of the 4th Imperial Fleet and the command of the 6th Submarine Fleet were in the Truk Lagoon, but on February 17, 1944, the Americans launched the military operation Hillston, which resulted in the sinking of more than 30 large and many small Japanese ships.

We go down to the depths to look at the underwater graveyard of ships in the Pacific Ocean.

This is how our Blue Lagoon Resort, which is located on the island of Dublon, looked like. The houses we live in are very reminiscent of the standard houses from the first Far Cry. So it seems. that a dude in a red Hawaiian shirt is about to jump out from behind the palm trees and start to wet everyone here. And somewhere here, nearby, there should be a skeleton of a Japanese aircraft carrier, then the similarity will be complete:

Fefan Island. You can't confuse him with anyone:

Let's go to the dive site:

Remains of the ship. The wheelhouse and engine telegraph:

In the engine room:

Inscription on board:

Depth 36 meters. Anti-tank guns on the deck of the Nippo Maru, there are 3 of them:

Depth 37 meters. Light Japanese tank at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean:

Depth 25 meters. Cargo-passenger steamer Rio de Janeiro Maru. lies on the starboard side. This is the left screw:

Depth 12 meters. View from the pilot's seat of the Nakajima B6N "Jill" torpedo bomber of the Imperial Japanese Navy:

Depth 36 meters. Another plane "Jill":

Sunken Japanese ship Shinkoku Maru, On the navigation bridge:

An Isuzu truck in the hold of a Shinkoku Maru ship. Only the front half remained of the ship, the rear part collapsed from the explosion of an American bomb:

The cargo boom of the Shinkoku Maru ship is covered in soft corals:

The fuselage of the Claude fighter - the predecessor of the famous Zero in the hold of the sunken Japanese ship Fujikawa Maru:

Fujikawa Maru ship. The hallmark of Truk Lagoon is the spooky air compressor in the lathe shop:

This is the end of a week of diving in the Truk Lagoon. About 10 sunken ships and two planes were examined. This is the sunset of the last evening on Doublon Island, Truk Lagoon.

When orbital stations, satellites, and other spacecraft reach the end of their useful lives, there are two scenarios. If the object was located in a high orbit (these may be geostationary satellites that are stationary relative to the Earth), it is easier to send it to a “burial orbit”. It is located in a zone in which the probability of a collision of obsolete objects with other devices is minimal - 200 kilometers above the geostationary orbit. But spaceships operating close to the Earth are more expedient to be burned in the atmosphere or, if they are massive, to be flooded at Point Nemo.

Actually, Point Nemo is the graveyard of spaceships, the most distant place on the planet from land. It is located 2688 kilometers from the islands of Dusi, Motu Nui and Maer. Moreover, the nearest island where people live, Pitcairn, is even further away - 470 kilometers from Ducie Island. As you understand, such a place was chosen for the "burial" of spacecraft for a simple reason - to avoid human casualties and any destruction. The presence of ships in this zone is also prohibited.

Another reason why Point Nemo can be considered an ideal place to "burial" spacecraft is that it is located in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, where there is practically no living creatures. Due to the annular current, almost all the garbage from the nearby waters is collected here.

For almost 47 years (since 1971), 263 space objects have been flooded at Point Nemo. Basically, these are unmanned trucks from the International Space Station. Moreover, the ISS itself, most likely, will also be “buried” in this zone. Let me remind you that in 2014 NASA extended its service life until 2024.

international space station

The largest object at Point Nemo was flooded in 2001, this is the Russian Mir station. Despite the fact that many parts fell off it immediately after the fall began, the structure did not completely burn out in the atmosphere. According to calculations, 20-25 tons of debris flew from the 135-ton station to the water. Moreover, at an altitude of 90 kilometers, the station split into several parts, so the fall radius was quite large. This is to the fact that it was not in vain that such a large territory was chosen for the flooding of spaceships.

Orbital station "Mir"

But even so, the “burials” did not always go smoothly. For example, in 1979, the wreckage of the American Skylab station fell in Australia, and in 1991, the wreckage of the Soviet Salyut-7 station fell in Argentina. Luckily there were no casualties.

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