Falling space junk


Published: Friday, October 21, 2011




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By GRETCHEN METZ, Staff Writer

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WEST WHITELAND — Before an automobile-size German satellite re-enters the atmosphere this weekend, Europeans in 10 cities are checking out its route through animation created by a Chester County company's visualization software.

According to the redefined re-entry schedule from the German Aerospace Center, the Roentgen Satellite — nicknamed ROSAT — re-entry to Earth is expected sometime over the weekend.

To keep the world alert, Analytical Graphics Inc., or AGI, has created a video of the satellite's movements. The software and the video it produced is currently on tour in Europe.

This is not AGI's first time educating people about space junk plunging toward Earth.

In September, Exton-based AGI developed an app for Android phones or tablets to look at the trip back home of the Upper Atmospheric Re

search Satellite, or UARS for short.

The Germans noted that the satellite has at least 30 pieces weighing 1.7 tons each.

"In any case," they said, "the possibility of danger to people is greatly reduced. The fragments will fall in the ocean or in uninhabited areas."

The chance that anyone will get smacked with space junk this week is only about 1 in 20 trillion. Still, who wants to get hit in the head with space debris?

Engineers at AGI used the company's STK software to create a video that shows ROSAT in its current orbit, the satellite's ground track, its burn-up in re-entry and a statistical representation of the debris.



Because of the global interest in UARS and ROSAT, AGI is getting a lot of media attention from the major networks, science websites and on YouTube where its UARS video was the top-viewed science and technology video for the week with 1.1 million views in five days.

"We're pleased about it," said Joanne Welsh, AGI spokeswoman. "We've always had a pretty good relationship with the media."

AGI is considered an expert in the area of "space situational awareness," or the understanding of what's happening in space with regard to satellites and debris, otherwise known as space junk, Welsh said. AGI software is used operationally in this segment of the space industry.

"That's our niche, science-based knowledge," Welsh said.

With UARS, AGI created a UARS "button" to be used with its Satellite AR app on Android phones.

But no button this time. The global use with UARS delivered so much traffic to the AGI site that it downed AGI's servers, Welsh said.

The software that was used to create the video is being showcased across Europe in October during the free STK Software Summit.

The software will be on display in Cologne, Germany today; Warsaw, Poland on Monday; Rome on Tuesday; Bremen, Germany on Wednesday; Munich on Thursday and Toulouse, France, on Friday, Oct., 28.

For the latest on ROSAT's path, visit www.agi.com and click into ROSAT blogs.