Russians Lost Contact With Their Space Ship - And Now, It's Hurtling Towards Us

♠ Posted by Unknown in iss,nasa,russia,satellite,space,spacestation at 4:55 PM

When you think about it, the goal of space organizations is mainly to shoot giant hunks of metal up into the air — but are there procedures in place for when one of those hunks come hurling back down to the ground?
According to NASA, the Russian cargo ship Progress 59 is making progress in the wrong direction, breaking from orbit and heading for our planet's surface. While some of it may burn up in the atmosphere, it's likely that some of the fragments will plummet down to Earth.

Progress 59 launched from Kazakhstan's Baikonur Cosmodrome with the intention of sending supplies to the International Space Station.

nasa.gov

However, once the unmanned ship reached its orbit, it lost contact with ground control and started spinning. The spinning is causing the ship to tumble toward Earth.

nasa.gov

If Russian flight controllers don't gain control of the ship within a week, it's possible that large fragments from the ship will hit the Earth's surface.

spiegel

Here is footage of the Progress 59's terrifying death spiral.

Luckily, the ISS has enough food and water that they can live healthily for months without Progress 59's help. The real danger is for us still living on the planet, since we might have to contend with what remains of the cargo ship once it finds the Earth's gravity again.