Lights shone in the skies over California and Oregon on Friday (17th). The phenomenon appears to have been caused by the return of a communication device from Japan.
The lights shone in the sky over the states of California and Oregon in the United States last Friday (17), intriguing local residents and producing speculation about possible visits by alien beings. For experts the phenomenon has an explanation, and it seems to have been caused by uncontrolled reentry of a piece of space junk.
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Jaime Hernandez was partying in California with friends, until some of them noticed the lights; according to him the phenomenon lasted about 40 seconds. “We were shocked but happy to see it,” he said. “No one has ever seen anything like it,” he concluded.
He posted the video on his Instagram profile, looking for someone who could clarify what happened. Watch:
Look at this photo on Instagram
For Jonathan McDowell, astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, there is no mystery: in an interview, he said he was 99% sure that the lights in the sky were caused by space debris reentering the Earth’s atmosphere and finished burned during the passage.
According to him, the object in question was communications equipment from Japan, which transmitted information from the International Space Station to a communications satellite and then back to Earth. It was launched in 2009 during a one-man mission. space shuttlesbut it was retired in 2017 when the satellite ended its operations.
“This is ICS-EF, a communication package for sending data between the Kibo module, the International Space Station and the Tsukuba Mission Control Center,” he said in a tweet posted on Saturday (18). In 2020 the device was removed from the station due to the space it took up.
This is ICS-EF, a Japanese communications package for sending data between the ISS’s Kibo module and Mission Control Tsukuba via the Kodama data transmission satellite. It was launched to the ISS by the Space Shuttle in 2009 and had a mass of 310 kg. pic.twitter.com/ygzHdmfQc0
— Jonathan McDowell (@planet4589) March 18, 2023
According to McDowell, the object’s orbit has been declining over the past few years, until it dipped enough for reentry. “What you’re seeing are actually small objects that release a lot of energy and are very high, traveling very fast,” he explained. He estimates that the object was moving at over 20,000km/h, while running at uncontrolled return, it is difficult to predict where the wreck might land; even so, there may be fragments in the Yosemite National Park region of California.
Source: The New York Times, ap
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Rose James is a Gossipify movie and series reviewer known for her in-depth analysis and unique perspective on the latest releases. With a background in film studies, she provides engaging and informative reviews, and keeps readers up to date with industry trends and emerging talents.
