Large NASA satellite falls back to Earth after decades in orbit

A 5,400-pound NASA satellite has returned safely to Earth after 38 years in space.

The decommissioned Earth Radiation Budget Satellite (ERBS) entered Earth’s atmosphere Sunday, January 8 at 11:04 p.m. ET over the Bering Sea between Alaska and eastern Russia, NASA confirmed in a tweet.

While much of the satellite will have burned up at high speed upon entering Earth’s atmosphere, there’s a chance some parts may have made it to sea level. However, as of Monday, there were no reports of incidents involving falling debris.

ERBS was launched into orbit by the Space Shuttle Challenger in October 1984. The spacecraft was part of NASA’s three-satellite Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) mission and carried three instruments — two to measure Earth’s radiant energy budget and one to measure stratospheric constituents, including ozone.

“Energy budget, the balance between the amount of solar energy that the Earth absorbs or radiates, is an important indicator of climate health, and understanding it can also help reveal weather patterns.” said NASA in a post on his website. “The concentration of ozone in the stratosphere plays an important role in protecting life on Earth from harmful ultraviolet radiation.”

When it began its journey in 1984, ERBS was only supposed to operate for two years, but it ended up beaming back data for 21 years until its retirement in 2005.

Destroying ERBS means slightly less space debris in low-Earth orbit. Had it been hit by another piece of garbage in recent years, it could have shattered into numerous pieces, leaving more debris in its wake.

Space debris from old satellites and rocket parts is a hazard to operational satellites, including the International Space Station, which occasionally has to adjust its orbit to avoid incoming debris.

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