According to a source on a NASA forum, ISS was not moved and no orbital change was made. The following is from the forum. Here's the details -- pass around as you like: UPI's Moscow bureau sent out a news story Friday PM that the space station had to change orbit to avoid collision with a fragment of a Chinese rocket that was destroyed last month in the anti-satellite test. The entire story is here: http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20070202-013112-8664r The story is NOT true, and should be disregarded. There has been no maneuver in space, and none are currently planned -- I verified with NASA spokesman John Ira Petty in Houston. The UPI story claims it is based on a 'Novosti' news agency story. I found the story, in English, and it DOES say that "We are diverting the orbit of the ISS to prevent a possible collision with large fragments of space debris, a decision the Russian Mission Control took together with the Johnson Space Center in Houston," a Russian Mission Control spokesman told Novosti Friday. http://en.rian.ru/world/20070202/60105727.html Sort of. Novosti botched the translation, and UPI didn't realize it -- and didn't try to verify with NASA. Here's the original Russian story: http://rian.ru/technology/cosmos/20070202/60093948.html Not to show off or anything .... I get by in Russian, and here's the much more accurate translation of the verb tenses: "In order to protect ISS from the possibility of collision with big pieces of space junk, we conduct a maneuver of avoidance to lead the station to the side. The Russian MCC takes the decision of carrying out this maneuver together with the Johnson space center in Houston." The Russian expert at Moscow Mission Control is speaking HYPOTHETICALLY. This is, he explains, what we DO in order to keep the station safe from space junk. It's NOT what we have just DONE, today. It has nothing to do with actual events today. The verb tenses indicate that. It's kind of scary how an alarming story can blast off, on such a volatile and frightening subject, based on misunderstanding. So it's only fair that the story has been featured on Drudge Report all day Saturday!! -- Greg Williams K4HSM k4hsm@knology.net http://www.twiar.org http://www.etskywarn.net ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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