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NASA's Swift telescope plunges back to Earth in fiery demise
DW.com • • general
Key Points:
- NASA's Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, a premier space telescope launched in 2004, re-entered Earth's atmosphere over North Sumatra, Indonesia, ending its nearly 22-year mission.
- The observatory, designed to study gamma ray bursts and other cosmic phenomena, exceeded its planned two-year mission, contributing to nearly 7,000 scientific papers.
- Swift fell out of orbit due to geomagnetic storms caused by solar eruptions, despite being in good condition prior to its descent.
- A July rescue attempt by private company Katalyst Space using the robotic LINK spacecraft failed when the vehicle lost attitude control and crashed back to Earth in September.
- Most of Swift burned up during re-entry, with some components possibly surviving, and no immediate ground damage was reported.
