NASA's Skylab Littering Fine

[Diche Bach]

Probably old news to a lot of you folks, but I just encountered this particular story.

Seems the town of Esperance, Australia fined NASA $400 for "littering" when Skylab junk fell in their vicinity back in 1979

Apparently NASA didn't find the joke funny, or else couldn't be bothered, because it took nearly thirty years, and "crowd-funding" by an American radio station to raise the money to pay the littering fine back in 2009

https://web.archive.org/web/20120722025053/http://www.esperanceexpress.com.au/news/local/news/general/littering-fine-paid/1488319.aspx?storypage=1

[p1t1o]

Hehe, that old chesnut! Love that story, especially as it was confirmed real and not just another urban myth/rumour!

You might like this - Taco Bell put a floating target in the south pacific before Mir came down, and promised that every person in the US would get a free taco if Mir hit the target!

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=4152

 

[Alshain]

It is pretty old news, but still funny none the less.  There is a museum there now, so in the end it educates people about our space programs and that is always a good thing.

http://www.space.com/21092-skylab-space-station-debris-photos.html

[Ten Key]

3 hours ago, Diche Bach said:

 

Apparently NASA didn't find the joke funny, or else couldn't be bothered. . .

I remember reading somewhere that NASA couldn't pay the fine because of legal/policy issues.

[Diche Bach]

LOL, free tacos. Shame Mir missed though . . . .

I guess the fact it is hard to hit a specific waypoint on reentry in KSP is not too far from the truth.

[RainDreamer]

Now it is interesting to see where ISS will end up after its life time.

[wumpus]

4 hours ago, RainDreamer said:

Now it is interesting to see where ISS will end up after its life time.

Pretty sure they can drop in the Pacific or Indian Ocean.  Somewhere like where flight 370 was expected to wind up.  When you can pretty much pick anywhere between +/- 50 degrees you have your choice.  Hubble has "only" 28.5 degrees, but that shouldn't interfere with finding some ocean.  The big catch is if Hubble will still be sufficiently controllable to de-orbit after they decide it can no longer continue *any* of it's mission and have to bring it down.  It has a de-orbiting engine, but the reaction wheels that it needs for control are the things most likely to fail.

Personally, I'd like to see another inflatable re-entry shield tests for all of the above.  Sure, even landing them in the Outback/Nevada* will likely not leave big enough parts to bother saving in a museum, but it would be a great test of possible asteroid mining technique.

* Hubble can't hit Nevada, nor any other mostly uninhabited part of the US.

[Emperor of the Titan Squid]

I say we disassemble the ISS and send some parts to l1.

[wumpus]

2 hours ago, Emperor of the Titan Squid said:

I say we disassemble the ISS and send some parts to l1.

You and what delta-v?  That is a lot of mass and a lot of delta-v.  I really don't think the inflatable heat shield idea is remotely possible, but it might work if somebody was looking to run a heat shield test at exactly the right time (within a few years, aerospace moves slow).

[Diche Bach]

Referring back to the SpaceLab "littering" episode . . . can you imagine the look on the "face" of that poor cow it took out?

Mooo, "Mmm, good grass here down under" munch, munch, munch . . . Mooo

Eh! What was that loud noise in the sky . . . turns to look and just catches a glimpse of a smoking hunk of metal as it screams in for a landing.

I wonder if there was enough cow left for steaks?

[Matuchkin]

On 18/08/2016 at 2:29 PM, RainDreamer said:

Now it is interesting to see where ISS will end up after its life time.

Quick! McDonald's! It's your chance!