One Soviet spacecraft from over half a century ago could be due to re-enter Earth's atmosphere as early as this week, but no matter how fascinating you find the debris once it lands, experts have urged everyone to stay away.
Oftentimes the danger surrounding objects entering Earth's atmosphere is the impact, and that was perhaps shown best after scientists feared that asteroid 2024 YR4 could strike our planet with enough power to wipe out an entire city.
Spacecrafts are typically designed specifically to survive the re-entry process though, and most landings go off without a hitch - including the recent return of stranded astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, as they even had a surprise visitor once they hit the sea.
As reported by Yahoo! News though, one old Soviet spacecraft is due to finally make its return despite launching over 50 years ago, as it malfunctioned on its way towards Venus and has been floating around in space ever since.
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Known as Cosmos 482 (or Kosmos 482 in some cases), astronomers current know very little about the former spacecraft's current status, only that it could speed back onto Earth as early as this week.
Current projections indicate that it could 'land' around May 10, but the uncertainty surrounding its shape, size, and the current weather in space leaves this only a vague estimate at the moment.
Experts have outlined that there's a good chance that the object re-entering our atmosphere is actually the ship's entry capsule, which has specifically been designed to survive the extreme heat of landing on a planet like Venus, so would be able to cope with Earth more than fine despite being over 50 years old.
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While that might make you worried that a giant spacecraft part is suddenly going to hurtle down from the air on top of you, experts have reassured everyone that the risk of injury upon impact is very low - roughly 1 in 25,000, to be exact.
Marco Langbroek told Yahoo! News that "as 70% of our planet is water, chances are good that it will end up in the ocean somewhere. Yes, there is a risk, but it is small. You have a larger risk of being hit by lightning once in your lifetime."
There is, however, a far greater risk once the spacecraft actually lands on Earth, as interacting with the debris is considered to be extremely risky and something you'll want to avoid.
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The allure of a crashed plane or mystery debris is often hard to resist, especially for those who love exploring abandoned areas or delving into dangers on a daily basis, but the uncertainty surrounding Cosmos 482 leaves a lot still up in the air.
Primarily the danger comes from the potential of harmful fuels from it's body which always pose a major health risk, and the craft itself could prove to be unstable so steering clear is best advised.
Additionally, it's technically law that Russia still own Cosmos 482 despite its age, no matter where it lands on our planet, and their space agency might want to recover and study it without interruption. Who knows, despite failing in its original mission, the spacecraft could still hold some secrets and answers about space.