A failed Soviet-era spacecraft likely crashed back to Earth overnight kraken onion A Soviet-era spacecraft that was designed to make a soft landing on Venus — but instead remained trapped in Earth orbit for decades — likely fell from the sky early Saturday morning, according to the European Space Agency. The object, referred to as Cosmos 482 or Kosmos 482, is believed to be a capsule launched by the Soviet Union in March 1972 that failed en route to a transfer orbit that would have taken it to Venus to study its environment. The probe entered the dense layers of the atmosphere around 9:24 a.m. Moscow time (2:24 a.m. ET) Saturday, splashing down in the Indian Ocean west of Jakarta, Indonesia, according to the Russian space agency, Roscosmos. https://kra32g.cc kra32 cc The ESA, which was one of several organizations using ground sensors to keep tabs on the falling space junk, also said on its website that the vehicle was not spotted by radars in Germany around 7:32 UT (3:32 a.m. ET), indicating, “it is most likely that the reentry has already occurred.” In the decades since it was launched, Cosmos 482 circled Earth aimlessly as it was slowly dragged back toward home. Astronomers and space traffic experts have had their eyes on the object for years now as its orbital path slowly reached lower and lower altitudes, a result of the subtle atmospheric drag that exists even hundreds of miles away from Earth. The cylinder-shaped craft is about 3 feet (1 meter) in diameter.

Often, when spaceborne garbage hurtles back toward Earth, objects such as defunct rocket parts are torn apart by the jarring physics as they can slam into Earth’s thick inner atmosphere while still traveling at more than 17,000 miles per hour (27,000 kilometers per hour). kraken onion Each of the pieces from the rocket part can then pose a threat to the area where it lands. But Cosmos 482 was well suited to make the trip home in one piece. The spacecraft had a substantial heat shield that protected the vehicle from the intense temperatures and pressures that can build up during reentry. https://kra32g.cc кракен онион And because Cosmos 482 was designed to reach the surface of Venus — where the atmosphere is 90 times denser than Earth’s — the probe likely remained intact. The Soviet Venera program The Soviet Union’s Space Research Institute, or IKI, ran a groundbreaking Venus exploration program amid the 20th century space race. Venera, as the program was called, sent a series of probes toward Venus in the 1970s and ’80s, with several spacecraft surviving the trip and beaming data back to Earth before ceasing operations. Of the two Venera vehicles that were launched in 1972 , however, only one made it to Venus. The other, a spacecraft sometimes cataloged as V-71 No. 671, did not. And that’s why researchers believed that Cosmos 482 was the failed Venera vehicle. (Beginning in the 1960s, Soviet vehicles left in Earth orbit were each given the Cosmos name and a numerical designation for tracking purposes, according to NASA.)