[meteorite-list] Space junk - marine life - shame on NASA

[mexicodoug at aim.com]

Hi Chris, Listees,

It isn't a shade of "illegal dumping" at issue as far as I can tell.

The possibly crass accusations that stated this thread might consider 
that transporting the old tank in a Space Shuttle back to earth would 
present a far greater danger to occupants and American residents in the 
landing path across the USA upon reentry rather than uncontrolled 
incineration it was given.  If you don't believe that, why don't you 
volunteer for a return flight with that oversized ammonia tank strapped 
in next to you in the belly of the Shuttle as the 30 year old vehicle 
starts shaking like hell in a controlled fall your life depends upon in 
reentry.  Even Iron Man might get a cold sweat on that one.

There was no safer way, unless you wanted to build a booster for it and 
blast it off from a mobile launch platform in low earth orbit into the 
Sun :).  Is this a sensible?

Best wishes and great health,
Doug


-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Peterson <clp at alumni.caltech.edu>
To: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
Sent: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 1:52 pm
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Space junk - marine life - shame on NASA


There is established international law dealing with legal liability for 
damage or injury caused by space debris reaching the ground. All space 
missions (in the U.S., at least) consider the likelihood of material 
surviving reentry. It's a question of statistics, and the chance of 
damage is almost always extremely small. In rare cases where something 
very large is being returned, it is usual for the object to be scuttled 
under controlled circumstances, to ensure reentry over the ocean. This 
refrigeration unit did not require a semi-controlled reentry because it 
was very unlikely enough material would survive to the ground to 
matter, regardless of where the decay occurred. 
 
Of course, if an object should land on a school, it's easy to say how 
much cheaper it would have been to return it. But that logic only 
applies if you return everything, and that would be far, far more 
expensive than the cost of a single object hitting a school. In this 
case, given the size of debris remaining (if any), it's likely that 
something hitting a roof would just knock off some shingles and slide 
down. 
 
I'll bet your risk is much greater from being hit by something falling 
off an airplane than being hit by something reentering from space. And 
neither risk is high enough to spend much time worrying about! 
 
Chris 
 
***************************************** 
Chris L Peterson 
Cloudbait Observatory 
http://www.cloudbait.com 
 
----- Original Message ----- From: "Greg Catterton" 
<star_wars_collector at yahoo.com> 
To: "Chris Peterson" <clp at alumni.caltech.edu> 
Cc: <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> 
Sent: Monday, November 03, 2008 12:30 PM 
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Space junk - marine life - shame on NASA 
 
> 
> It is the first thing I was aware of, until reading more about it. 
> I know what ifs are really meaningless, however... if it had landed 
on a > school full of kids, Im sure the cost of returning to earth 
would have > been very cheap compared to the loss of life. 
> If it had impacted on a house or other private property, would NASA 
have > been liable? 
> 
> The replies about this have been really good and informative, Thanks 
to > all for your input. 
> 
> Greg 
 
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