Spaceship cemetery, or where does space debris fall? Where is the spaceship graveyard?

The most distant point on Earth from land has many names, but it is most often called Point Nemo, or the oceanic pole of inaccessibility. It is located at coordinates 48°52.6′ south latitude and 123°23.6′ west longitude. The nearest land island is approximately 2,250 kilometers away. Due to its remote location, this place is ideal for the burial of spacecraft, and therefore space agencies often call it a “graveyard.” spaceships».

“This place is located in the Pacific Ocean and represents the most distant point on our planet from any human civilization,” NASA aerospace agency describes Point Nemo.

However, Bill Ilor, an aerospace engineer and specialist in spacecraft re-entry, has a different definition for this place:

“This is the best place on the planet to drop something from space without causing any third-party damage.”

In order to “bury” another spacecraft in this cemetery, space agencies need some time to carry out the necessary calculations. As a rule, smaller satellites do not end their lives at the Nemo point because, NASA explains, “the heat created by atmospheric friction to a greater extent destroys a satellite falling at a speed of several thousand kilometers per hour even before it falls. TA-dah! It's like magic. It’s as if there was no satellite!”

It's a different story for larger objects like Tiangong-1, China's first orbital space station, launched in September 2011, which weighs about 8.5 tons. China lost control of the 12-meter orbiting laboratory in March 2016. The forecasts are disappointing. The station should fall to Earth sometime in early 2018. Where exactly? No one knows yet. The same Aylor, working for non-profit organization Aerospace Corporation, says his company will likely be hesitant to make predictions until five days before the station is expected to break up in Earth's atmosphere. When this happens, hundreds of kilograms of various metal parts such as the titanium plating of the station, fuel tanks and much more will continue to fall at speeds of over 300 kilometers per hour until they eventually fall to the surface of the planet.

Since China has lost control of the Tiangong-1 station, the country cannot confidently predict whether it will fall into Point Nemo.

Interestingly, astronauts living aboard the International Space Station are actually the closest to this very point of Nemo. The thing is that the ISS circles above the Earth (and in particular above the place we are talking about) at an altitude of about 400 kilometers, while the piece of land closest to Point Nemo is much further away.

According to Popular Science, from 1971 to mid-2016, space agencies from around the world buried at least 260 spacecraft here. At the same time, as the Gizmodo portal notes, the number of scrapped spacecraft has increased sharply since 2015, when they total number was only 161 at that time.

Here, at a depth of more than three kilometers, I found my last refuge Soviet space station Mir, more than 140 Russian cargo spacecraft, several European Space Agency cargo ships (such as the first Jules Verne ATV-series robotic cargo ship), and even one of SpaceX's rockets, according to Smithsonian.com reports. True, the spacecraft here can hardly be called neatly stacked in one pile. Aylor notes that such large objects as the Tangun-1 station can fall apart when falling, covering an area of 1,600 kilometers along and several dozen across. The Nemo point “exclusion” territory itself covers an area of more than 17 million square kilometers, so finding a specific fallen spacecraft here is not as easy as it might seem at first glance.

The European Space Agency's Jules Verne cargo ship breaks apart as it enters the atmosphere. September 29, 2008

Of course, not all spacecraft end up in this spacecraft graveyard, but the chances that part of a collapsing spacecraft will fall on one of the people, regardless of where this spacecraft falls on Earth, are very small, notes Aylor.

“Of course, nothing is impossible. However, since the beginning of the space age, the last incident that comes to mind occurred back in 1997. Then in Oklahoma, a half-burnt part of a rocket fell on a woman,” explains Aylor.

The same unburnt piece of a rocket and the woman it fell on

A dead spacecraft can create a much greater danger in orbit.

The real threat of space debris

On this moment on various heights There are about 4,000 artificial satellites circling the Earth. And there should be even more in the near future. Elon Musk and his company SpaceX promise to launch their own Internet network, which will be provided by 4,425 new satellites. In other words, there are still a lot of different spacecraft in orbit, but soon there will be no crowd at all.

According to statistics from Space-Track.org, in addition to satellites, there are thousands of uncontrolled rocket remains in orbit, as well as more than 12,000 other artificial objects larger than a human fist. And this is if we also omit the countless number of different screws, bolts, pieces of dried paint (from the skin of missiles) and many metal particles.

“Over time, countries began to realize that they were literally littering space and this created a serious threat not only to their systems, but to everyone,” adds Aylor.

The worst thing, according to experts from the same European Space Agency, can happen when two pieces of space debris collide with each other, especially when these objects are large.

Random collisions of the same satellites, although very rare, do occur. The last such incidents were in 1996, 2009 and two in 2013. As a result of such events, as well as as a result of the deliberate destruction of satellites, huge number space debris that poses a threat to other operational satellites and the danger of a chain effect.

“We found that this debris can remain in orbit for hundreds of years,” comments Aylor.

To prevent the emergence of new space debris, aging spacecraft must be deorbited over time. Many space agencies, as well as private space companies, are now considering the possibility of creating a special scavenger spacecraft that could capture obsolete satellites and other spacecraft and send them straight to the underwater spacecraft graveyard on Earth.

However, the same Aylor, like some other experts, insists on developing new technologies and methods with which it will be possible to capture, drag and remove the old uncontrolled space debris, which has accumulated in orbit and poses a real threat.

“I proposed something like the XPRIZE and Grand Challenge, where the three most suitable spacecraft concepts could be selected and grants would be given to develop them and then use them to clean up the orbit of the planet,” says Aylor.

Unfortunately, technical difficulties in implementing such plans are far from the first place among the problems when there is such a thing as bureaucracy.

“Technical difficulties are far from the most important thing here. The main problem here is the idea of private property. For example, no other nation has the right to touch the same American satellites. If this happened, it could be considered an act of military aggression,” explains Aylor.

According to Aylor, in the face of a common threat, nations around the world must unite, because this is the only way to effectively solve such problems.

East of the coast of New Zealand, several thousand km from land in the waters Pacific Ocean is one of the most incredible landfills in the world. Hidden from the eyes of people, the trash can is surrounded only by the turbulent currents of the ocean, and there is not a single island nearby. At the bottom, at a depth of 4 km, lurks a whole field of broken fragments of old satellites, long out of commission. This is the “Spaceship Graveyard”, where space agencies from all over the world send to last way their decommissioned satellites and aircraft.

When a satellite or orbital station reaches the end of its service life, there are two different ways to develop a scenario for removing spent equipment from its place of operation. If the satellite's orbit is too high, as is the case with geosynchronous spacecraft, engineers send space scrap metal further into the sky into a debris disposal orbit, where all too massive structures are sent. This orbit is several hundred kilometers from the farthest trajectory of controlled satellites. This distance was chosen in order to reduce to zero the likelihood of a collision between decommissioned spacecraft and still functioning equipment.

For satellites that operate too close to Earth, it is much easier to do the opposite. If the satellite is small enough, it will burn up on its own. earth's atmosphere, as happens with hundreds of meteors every day. But if the station is quite large, and there is a chance that it will not completely burn up in the Earth's atmosphere during the fall, its decommissioning requires careful planning.

The old satellite has to be accompanied all the way to the water, directed to a strictly defined zone in order to avoid a collision with land and especially with human habitats. Space agencies have a responsibility to ensure that outdated technology does not cause accidents or injuries to civilians.

Known as Point Nemo, the spaceship graveyard is the location in the ocean farthest from any existing landmass. This location got its name in honor of the well-known hero of Jules Verne’s book about Captain Nemo. WITH Latin language the name translates to “no one,” which is perfect for such a remote and isolated place. Point Nemo lies approximately 2,688 km from the three closest islands - Ducie Atoll in the north, Easter Island (or Motu Nui) in the northeast, and Maher Island in the south. Another name for this place is the oceanic pole of inaccessibility. Point Nemo received this status for its maximum distance from all sea routes in the Pacific Ocean. The cruising of sea ships here is simply prohibited.

In addition to the fact that the space dump is located at a decent distance from people, it is also practically safe for the marine inhabitants of the region. And this is great, because no one would want decommissioned “pieces of iron” to destroy the local ecosystem. How is this possible in the ocean? It's simple - Point Nemo is located in the southern waters of the great Pacific Gyre, which is a large circular sea current. A powerful whirlpool sucks in everything household waste from the nearest coastal waters in District. For this reason, Point Nemo is practically uninhabited by marine life and has become a kind of oceanic desert, which is also called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Naturally, scientists at one time considered this area an ideal place for space exploration and disposal of spent satellites and waste from space expeditions.

From 1971 to 2016, more than 263 official space debris disposal sites have been held at Point Nemo. Most often, unmanned trucks from the International Space Station are sunk here. The ISS itself will ultimately be buried in this landfill when its service life comes to an end. The approximate date is 2028, but there is a possibility of extending the life of this space object.

ISS. Photo: NASA

The most grandiose funeral at Point Nemo took place on March 23, 2001, when, after 15 years of service, the 135-ton Russian space station Mir was immersed in the waters of the Pacific Ocean. During deorbit, Mir entered our atmosphere at a distance of 100 km from Earth. Even in such rarefied air, the station lost some of its fragments at the beginning of its dying journey. For example, the solar panels fell off the World almost immediately. And 90 km from the surface of the ocean, the spacecraft fell apart into several parts, and fragments burning in the atmosphere were visible in the evening sky even from the Fiji Islands. By the time it entered the water, only 20-25 tons of structures remained from the World.

So if you imagined a space cemetery as a platform covered with satellites gracefully rising above the bottom orbital stations, you will be disappointed. The remains of these high-tech devices were scattered over hundreds and thousands of kilometers in small parts. When the World broke up into fragments in the atmosphere, it left a trail of debris 1500 km long and 100 km wide.

Even with the best-planned management of space station sinking, it will never be a seamless landing, said Holger Krag, head of the European Space Agency's (ESA) space waste office. The nature of the destruction of such structures requires experts to prepare a fairly large area for the burial of the satellite. The fragments will never fall in the same place.

That's why Point Nemo - the best choice. Located 2,688 km from any nearest land, it gives space design engineers a fairly wide safety net. This is very important in case of errors in the calculations of possible trajectories of falling remains.

Mir space station

An automated cargo spacecraft (ARV) named Jules Verne, developed by ESA, disintegrates in the Earth's atmosphere on September 29, 2008 over the uninhabited Pacific Ocean southwest of Tahiti. Photo: NASA.

The volume of space debris in low-Earth orbit has reached a critical threshold, experts say. It is already becoming dangerous not only for orbiting spacecraft, but for all of us. IN near-Earth space More than 20 thousand fragments are rotating. NASA started talking about the need to launch a special cleaner into space.

Is it possible to spend in space general cleaning and how can this be done? The editor-in-chief of the “Cosmonautics News” magazine, Igor Marinin, spoke about this on the air of “Morning of Russia”.

The expert noted that the fall of this space debris is practically not dangerous for the Earth. According to him, the panic, which is associated, in particular, with the fall of the American UARS satellite, was provoked by incompetent people. Contrary to fears, the satellite did not fall on someone’s head, but sank safely in the Pacific Ocean far from land. “The probability that debris will fall on some populated area is negligible - less than one ten-thousandth of a percent,” Marinin noted.

According to the expert, it cannot be said that the problem of space debris has not been dealt with before. This issue has been raised more than once in the UN and international space organizations. “In 1997, an advisory decision was made that every country involved in space activities should clean up after itself. For example, garbage cans were simply thrown away from the Mir station. Now nothing is thrown away from the International Space Station,” he said.

However, collecting the debris that is already in orbit is a big problem. You cannot collect these debris with a magnet - the magnet attracts steel alloys, and the debris is mainly duralumin. Japanese experts suggested catching space debris with a net, but this is also not a suitable option - the debris moves in different directions and at different speeds.

In Russia, this issue is not yet considered relevant at all and no funds are being invested in its solution. However, this garbage does not pose a direct threat to the Earth. “Most space debris slowly but surely falls and burns up in the atmosphere. If international laws and declarations are now adopted so that every country involved in space activities undertakes to deal with this debris, then this problem will not be so pressing. All debris will will self-destruct, and new ones will appear less and less,” Marinin concluded.

Spaceship Graveyard- a common name for the 4 km deep region of the South Pacific Ocean, closed to shipping, where the remains of spacecraft end up after they are decommissioned. It is located near Christmas Island,

3900 km from the New Zealand city of Wellington. Most spacecraft burn up in dense layers of the atmosphere, but part of the ship's skin and other parts that did not burn out when they were taken out of orbit fall into this area. Stations that have exhausted their service life and ships with cargo loaded into their compartments are subject to flooding. various kinds garbage and waste from space expeditions. As a rule, only refractory structural elements reach the water surface. In particular, this area is used by the Mission Control Center (MCC) to scuttle Progress space trucks. The remains of the Mir space station were sunk in this area in 2001. The history of the “cemetery” also includes two emergency incidents: in 1979, the remains of the American Skylab station fell in western Australia, and in 1991, the debris of the Russian Salyut-7 station partially scattered in Argentina. Both incidents resulted in no casualties or destruction. In March 2001, during the deorbit of the Mir complex, the authorities of Australia, Japan and the Fiji islands, located at a very impressive distance from the “cemetery”, recommended their citizens not to go outside, but to stay exclusively in residential buildings and institutions and other shelters. Every year, several dozen spacecraft find their final refuge in the ocean “cemetery.” According to representatives of the Mission Control Center of the Federal Space Agency, “the accepted practice of destroying space debris using ‘trucks’ does not harm the Earth’s ecology.” The area is completely closed to navigation.

The sinking area of space stations and expendable cargo ships removed from Earth orbit, known as the "spaceship graveyard", is located in the Pacific Ocean at the 40th parallel. Southern Hemisphere near Christmas Island, far from shipping routes and populated areas. At the same time, the history of the “cemetery” also includes two emergency incidents: in 1979, the remains of the American Skylab station fell in western Australia, and in 1991, the debris of the Russian Salyut-7 station partially scattered in Argentina. Both incidents resulted in no casualties or destruction. In March 2001, during the deorbit of the Mir complex, the authorities of Australia, Japan and the Fiji islands, located at a very impressive distance from the “cemetery”, recommended their citizens not to go outside, but to stay exclusively in residential buildings and institutions and other shelters.

Stations and ships that have exhausted their service life with various types of garbage and waste from space expeditions loaded into their compartments are subject to flooding. As a rule, only refractory structural elements reach the surface of the water, which then sink to a depth of about 4 kilometers (most of the fragments burn up in the dense layers of the atmosphere). Every year, several dozen spacecraft find their final refuge in the ocean “graveyard.” According to representatives of the Mission Control Center of the Federal Space Agency, “the accepted practice of destroying space debris using “trucks” does not harm the Earth’s ecology. Source: http://kvazar.org/showthread.php?t=18136 The final orbit of the Mir station. Debris Mir station over the Pacific Ocean Source: http://www.mir.avia.ru/

The final round of the Mir station.

The wreckage of the Mir station over the Pacific Ocean

Source: http://www.mir.avia.ru/

The first European cargo spacecraft, the Jules Verne, was also sunk in the South Pacific Ocean, in the so-called spaceship graveyard in a given area at coordinates 40 degrees S. and 145 degrees W.D. 2500 km east of New Zealand, 6000 km west of Chile and 2500 km south of French Polynesia, September 29, 2008 at approximately 17:53 Moscow time. Part of the ship's structures burned out in the dense layers of the atmosphere during the removal of the spacecraft from orbit. The ship undocked from the ISS on September 6, after which it was sent to a designated area of the ocean for flooding. Source: http://www.cybersecurity.ru/space/56091.html Photograph of the fall of the ship "Jules Verne": Image source and information about it: http://www.astronet.ru/db/msg/1231393

The autonomous flight of the Progress M-66 cargo spacecraft is ending; on Monday evening the ship will be deorbited and scuttled in a non-navigable area of the Pacific Ocean, a representative of the Mission Control Center told RIA Novosti. The ship was undocked from the station on May 6 and sent on a controlled autonomous flight for scientific purposes. At 14:28:30 UTS, the Progress engines will receive a command to brake, after which the ship will enter the dense layers of the Earth's atmosphere, where it will burn up. Fragments of the Progress will splash down in the estimated area of the Pacific Ocean at 15:14:45 UTS. The coordinates of the center of the fall group of unburnt structural elements are 42°34" south latitude and 139°24" west longitude. Source: MCC

The Progress M-67, the last space truck with an analog control system, is sunk in the Pacific Ocean. The Interfax agency was informed about this by the Mission Control Center. The wreckage of the ship, which did not burn up in the atmosphere, fell far from shipping routes, about three thousand kilometers east of Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. On September 21, the truck undocked from the ISS and set off on an autonomous flight, during which it took part in the Plasma-Progress experiment. As part of this experiment, the characteristics of plasma clouds that arise around a spacecraft when its engines operate in low Earth orbit were studied. At the ISS, the expensive Kurs docking equipment was removed from the Progress. The garbage and equipment that had accumulated at the station was loaded on board the ship. Instead of the analog "Progress" of the old series, trucks with a digital control system will be used - more reliable and spacious. Two such ships have already been sent into orbit. The first of them delivered cargo to the ISS in November last year.

The practical benefits of space exploration are undeniable. This includes satellite television and radio broadcasting, and global internet, and weather forecasts, and the study of the Earth's biosphere. The other side of the issue is the pollution of near-Earth and terrestrial space by space debris. Previously, debris from spaceships fell to Earth anywhere. But with the development of the space industry, the question arose of finding a safe place to bury the remains of spacecraft. And the place was found - this is a spaceship cemetery located in the Pacific Ocean, where all the space agencies of the world drown them.

Computer simulation result

When the development of astronautics reached a certain size, the question arose about a place where it would be possible to place the remains of spacecraft without damage to the biosphere and sufficiently remote from human habitation.

Croatian engineer Hrvoje Lukatela in 1992 through development computer model identified a location that meets the specified parameters. He proposed to call it, which later became a cemetery for spaceships, Point Nemo - the name of the hermit of humanity from the fantastic story of Jules Verne.

Point in the ocean

The most distant place from people was a point in the South Pacific Ocean, from which to the nearest uninhabited islands- Dusi Atoll and Motu Nui Island (Easter Island) - a distance of 2688 kilometers. 470 kilometers from Ducie Atoll is the nearest inhabited island of Pitcairn with 49 inhabitants.

Point Nemo and the oceanic pole of inaccessibility are the names of the spaceship graveyard, whose coordinates are 48 degrees south latitude and 123 degrees west longitude. There are no ships, no planes, and people are very far away.

Environmental aspect

Point Nemo is also called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This is due to the presence of a great gyre here - a large ring current, like a funnel, drawing into its center all the debris of the nearest waters. This strong current did not allow rich plant and animal life and turned this place into a kind of desert at a depth of 4 kilometers in the ocean.

Environmentalists admit that the decision to make a spaceship cemetery here does the least harm to the world's oceans. But to say that negative consequences No, not at all, not possible. After all, no one has reversed the damage to the ozone layer and atmospheric pollution by combustion products.

Why do we need this?

Unfortunately, modern spacecraft are not designed for reusable use. There are exceptions (Shuttle, Dragon, Falcon), but they are expensive, few in number and severely damaged when returning to Earth. Basically, when a spacecraft's safety margin, technological capabilities, and service life are exhausted, there are two ways to remove it from orbit. The first is to send it to the spaceship graveyard in the Pacific Ocean. The second is to send it into a distant orbit hundreds of kilometers from the orbits of controlled satellites.

It is more profitable to direct small objects with an orbit close to Earth to the planet’s atmosphere, where it will burn up practically without a residue. In case of large satellite its chances of burning out completely are minimal, requiring careful planning for its decommissioning and a place where the remains will safely land.

Grand dump

Today, about 260 objects from outer space are buried in the spaceship cemetery. Most of all there are unmanned trucks that returned from the International Space Station. And it, too, will become a flooded space station, according to forecasts around 2028.

But if the reader imagines this place as a site where sunken space stations and satellites lie, then this is not entirely true. Even if everything is planned and calculated, the object will never make a complete landing; there will always be an error. Its small charred debris will be scattered over hundreds of kilometers and that is why vast areas are required for the burial of spacecraft.

The most impressive funeral

This happened on the evening of March 23, 2001, when the Russian Mir station was removed from orbit and sank in these waters. She served for 15 years and weighed 135 tons. At an altitude of 100 kilometers, the batteries separated from the station; at an altitude of 90 kilometers, it fell apart into several parts, the flames of which were seen even by residents of the island of Fiji.

About 25 tons of metal from the station reached the ocean waters. The length of the trail of debris and debris was 1.5 kilometers, and the width was up to 100 kilometers. Residents of Australia, the Fiji Islands and Japan were then advised to take refuge in shelters, but many even drew landmarks on their lawns and hoped that the Russian station would fall into their yard.

Flooding errors

There have also been dangerous cases involving the burial of spacecraft. So, in 1979, something went wrong with the American space station Skylab and its remains fell in western Australia. The situation repeated itself in 1991, but with Russian station"Salyut-7". Its debris fell in Argentina. Fortunately, in both cases it happened in sparsely populated areas, there were no casualties or destruction.

Not only on Earth

IN Lately Pictures of the planet Mars taken by the Curiousity rover and orbital probes appeared in the press. They clearly show craters on the surface of the red planet. There is a version that they are formed from engines during the landing and takeoff of alien ships. Ufologists claim that this is a cemetery for spaceships and a repair site for civilizations unknown to us.

Eco-friendly way out - “Liquidator”

By 2025, the Roscosmos agency promises to launch the autonomous vehicle “Liquidator” into the geostationary orbit of the planet. His task will be to clean up the remains aircraft and other debris from orbit.

The “space cleaner” will cost about 11 billion rubles, weigh 4 tons and be used for 10 years. The project considers two options for disposing of space debris - placing it in higher orbits and dumping it in the Pacific Ocean in a spaceship graveyard. Environmentalists are for the first option, although it is not perfect. It will simply push the solution to the problem of space clutter into the future.

If previously few people thought about where the remains of spacecraft that did not burn up in the atmosphere go, now the reader knows the answer to the question of where the spaceship cemetery is located on Earth - at Point Nemo in the depths of the Pacific Ocean.

The problem of space debris disposal is becoming increasingly widespread, environmentalists and specialists space research are looking for a way to minimize damage to the biosphere of our home from the consequences of space exploration. I would like to believe that in the near future these ideas will turn into reality, and we will be able to leave our descendants a prosperous and prosperous planet without spaceship cemeteries on its surface.

More than 15.5 thousand artificial satellites now revolve around the Earth. There are military apparatus, weather stations, communications and telecommunications satellites. All this scrap metal sooner or later falls to Earth. But not just like that, but in specific place of our planet. They call it Point Nemo. This is a real spaceship graveyard.

Spacecraft disposal methods

To begin with, let’s clarify a little how spacecraft are “written off” and disposed of.

When a satellite or orbiting space station reaches the end of its life, there are only two ways to remove it from orbit and retire it. If the satellite has a very high orbit, such as geosynchronous satellites, then engineers “push” them further into space, into the so-called graveyard orbit. It lies several hundred kilometers above the orbit of the highest satellites in use. Therefore, the probability of a collision between necessary devices and unnecessary ones is reduced to almost zero.

For satellites that orbit lower to the planet's surface, it is better and more economical to slow down their speed and let them fall back to Earth. If the satellite is small, it will burn up and be completely destroyed in the atmosphere, just like the hundreds of meteors that fall on the planet every day. But if the satellite is large, and there is a chance that it may not completely burn up in the air, then the process of disposing of it will require a little more attention and planning.

The idea is to send the satellite into the ocean, far from any islands and continents, where the device, which has served its life, will not harm anyone. The location chosen should also be away from shipping lanes. Such a place in the ocean exists, and geographers call it the “oceanic pole of inaccessibility.” Here you can find a real spaceship cemetery.

We will place Point Nemo in the Antarctica category, since both geographical object do not belong to any state.

Where is the Spaceship Graveyard?

4,800 kilometers from the eastern shores of New Zealand, and 3,600 kilometers from the western coast of Chile in the South Pacific Ocean lies Point Nemo, in the area of which there is one of the largest landfills on the planet. The nearest islands are 2688 km away. In the north is Ducie Island, part of the Pitcairn Islands, in the south is the Antarctic Island of Maher, in the northeast is Motu Nui, near Easter Island.

If you suddenly find yourself here (which is extremely unlikely), you will see absolutely nothing but the endless expanses of water of the Pacific Ocean. To see the spaceship graveyard, you need to go down to the bottom of the ocean, to a depth of about 4 kilometers. This is where all the world's space agencies send spent satellites.

Name and features of Point Nemo

Point Nemo began to call this place in honor of the famous Captain Nemo (a character from the writer Jules Verne). The name also means "nobody" in Latin and is very appropriate for such a remote and almost inaccessible place on the planet.

Point Nemo, in addition to its remoteness from the population, is also almost uninhabited marine life. This is good because we don't want space debris to affect sea life. Point Nemo is located in the center of the so-called South Pacific Ocean, which is a large rotating ocean current. This rotation blocks the flow nutrients, flowing from coastal strip continents. In addition, in this part of the ocean there are quite large depths and the water temperature is about +7 o C. All this makes Point Nemo and the area around it relatively lifeless, similar to an ocean desert. In other words, this the best place for disposal of satellites and space waste.

How many remains are there in the spaceship cemetery?

From 1971 to 2016, 263 devices were buried at Point Nemo. Unmanned cargo trucks are regularly flooded here vehicles from the ISS (International Space Station). Eventually, the ISS itself will be sunk at this location when its service life ends. Presumably this will be 2028 if the service life is not extended.

Disposal of Mir station

The largest burial in the spaceship cemetery was recorded on March 23, 2001. After 15 years of operation, our Mir space station, weighing 143 tons, was sunk in this place. As it descended, the station, entering the dense layers of the atmosphere, began to crumble at an altitude of about 100 km. By the time of the collision with water, the mass of the station was no more than 25 tons. Everything else either burned down or was torn off and scattered over tens and hundreds of kilometers around.

If you think that the spaceship cemetery is a flat area with neat burials and a guard at the entrance, then you are mistaken. Submerged vehicles and their parts can be scattered for many kilometers across the ocean. For example, when the Mir station disintegrated in the atmosphere, its debris scattered 1,500 kilometers in length and 100 kilometers in width.

As you understand, Point Nemo allows you to level out significant calculation errors when flooding spacecraft.

Disposal of another satellite at point Nemo

Be that as it may, the amount of garbage on the planet is growing, and this is very, very bad. It's corny, but true. Even the paradise of the planet - the Maldives - has its own huge landfill on the island of Thilafushi.