A failed Soviet-era spacecraft likely crashed back to Earth overnight
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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.
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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.
