Most of the satellite should burn up upon return, but some parts are expected to survive.
There are a lot of defunct satellites in orbit that are still dangerous to Earth due to their possible collision with our planet. Today, April 19, one of these satellites will enter our planet's atmosphere, which is known as the Reuven Ramaty High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager (RHESSI). This is an American satellite that was retired in 2018, and since then, it has been orbiting the Earth in a way that raises the risk of a collision with our planet.
According to NASA, RHESSI observed solar flares and coronal mass ejections from its low-Earth orbit, helping scientists understand the underlying physics of how such powerful bursts of energy are created.
The space agency also predicts the time of the satellites' reentry into the earth's atmosphere in a statement.
"As of Monday, April 17, the Department of Defence predicted the 660-pound spacecraft will reenter the atmosphere at approximately 9:30 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, April 19, with an uncertainty of +/- 16 hours. NASA and the Defence Department will continue to monitor reentry and update predictions," it said.
According to the most recent predictions, the spacecraft will re-enter Earth's atmosphere on Thursday at 7:00 a.m. (IST).
NASA expects most of the spacecraft to burn up as it travels through the atmosphere, but some components are expected to survive reentry.
The risk of harm coming to anyone on Earth is low-approximately 1 in 2,467.
The spacecraft launched aboard an Orbital Sciences Corporation Pegasus XL rocket with a mission to image the high-energy electrons that carry a large part of the energy released in solar flares.
It achieved this with its sole instrument, an imaging spectrometer, which recorded X-rays and gamma rays from the sun.
Before RHESSI, no gamma-ray images or high-energy X-ray images of solar flares had been taken.
Data from RHESSI provided vital clues about solar flares and their associated coronal mass ejections.
These events release the energy equivalent of billions of megatons of TNT into the solar atmosphere within minutes and can have effects on Earth, including the disruption of electrical systems. Understanding them has proven challenging.