And here they remind. Russian astronauts threw garbage while leaving the ISS into an open space (video)
Technology has appeared its Telegram channel. Subscribe not to miss the latest and most intrusive news from the world of science! Two astronauts from the Russian Federation gathered all unnecessary equipment after moving the gateway at the ISS segment into a large pile and intentionally sent it to the space. During the direct broadcast of the exit to open space, after the garbage flew, one of the Russian astronauts even said goodbye to these waste and noted that they "fly beautifully".
Although it may seem like throwing unnecessary equipment into space, experts claim that nothing unusual happened and this garbage burned in the Earth's atmosphere after a while. Although it looks very strange.
But at the same time, despite the planned garbage release into space, which no longer clogs orbit, experts believe that such unnecessary parts of the equipment do not always burn in the atmosphere of our planet and only complicate the problem of accumulation of large amounts of space debris in orbit. Although not always the release of garbage by astronauts in space is planned. Many episodes are known when astronauts have accidentally lost something when entering open space.
For example, as early as 1965, the first American to be outlined in space, Ed White, forever went down in history when he accidentally lost his spare glove. And six years ago, two astronauts of NASA, Peggy Witon and Shane Kimbro, lost in space a bag with a protective screen against space debris. According to experts, burning garbage in the Earth's atmosphere has already become a tradition for astronauts of the ISS.
Yes, they sometimes throw equipment just as the Russians did, but most often all garbage from the space station is loaded into the Cygnus cargo ship. When it is completely filled, it is sent back on the ground, where it burns in the planet's atmosphere. Modern satellites are designed so that after completion of their work, it is burned in the Earth's atmosphere, but it does not always happen immediately, and they are swept long in orbit.
In recent decades, according to scientists, the Earth orbit has become a real space dump, where parts of rockets, satellites and various equipment are flying. Experts believe that approximately 1 million fragments of 1 mm garbage are now circling around the Earth. And the wreckage is the size of a football ball and a little larger, there are about 23 thousand pieces. Scientists believe that all these fragments can be damaged by working satellites, space telescopes and even the ISS.
The orbital station had already repeatedly evaded space debris so that they did not cause damage. Experts believe that the situation will be very interesting if the ISS will encounter the fragments of the equipment that its astronauts were thrown away. Focus has already wrote that on May 21, the ISS should go to space tourists who will spend a week here. During their orbit, they will conduct a very important experiment: the population of human stem cells will be grown for the first time.