What we know about Russia’s anti-satellite fire


Laure Dautriche, edited by Gauthier Delomez

Russia admitted Tuesday having pulverized one of its old satellites in orbit since the 1980s. The United States, France condemned this operation which endangered the astronauts present on board the International Space Station. Several hundred pieces of debris are now in orbit.

A size explosion. Russia admitted on Tuesday that it had pulverized one of its old satellites in orbit since the 1980s with a missile. A shot that could have endangered the lives of astronauts present in the International Space Station (ISS). The United States and France have denounced this operation by Moscow, which is also accused of having generated several hundred polluting debris in space. For the moment, the European Space Agency has listed 1,500 pieces caused by the explosion.

ISS astronauts ready to depart

On board the ISS, precautionary measures have been adopted. The crew of seven astronauts, present at an altitude of 400 kilometers, had to apply the emergency procedure and take refuge for several hours in their rescue ships – Russians on one side, Americans on the other – to prepare to leave the station in the event of a problem.

For now, experts are trying to find out more about these hundreds of pieces of debris. “They are new, so we do not yet know exactly their trajectories and their exact orbits”, explains Didier Schmitt of the European Space Agency, who specifies: “For security reasons, it is not possible to move the station (the ISS) since we do not know exactly the orbits that can be impacted”.

The international community sees this Russian anti-satellite fire as a risk of militarization of the cosmos. With the fear that in the more or less near future, a country could destroy the satellites of other countries in this way, and thus paralyze many communication or location activities.



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