Dive Brief:
- The commercial cargo ship Cygnus has completed a one-month visit to the International Space Station (ISS).
- Cygnus left Earth -- specifically, Virginia -- in mid-July. It contained over 3,000 pounds of important cargo that was delivered to the orbiting outpost.
- On Friday, ISS astronauts released the supply ship into outer space. It contained 3,500 pounds of trash.
Dive Insight:
On August 17, Orbital Sciences Corp. -- the group that launched Cygnus into space -- will guide the craft through the atmosphere to incinerate it. Six space station astronauts are expected to record the re-entry, and the video will be used for future analysis, according to CTV News.
Refuse returning to Earth isn't the only trash in space. In fact, there are millions of bits of small debris and more than 21,000 pieces of trash larger than four inches cycling in space, according to SPACE.com. Those numbers are only expected to grow and pose a potential threat to the structural integrity of satellites and fuel cells.
