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Russian and U.S. satellites collide over Siberia

12 February 2009 08:23 (UTC +04:00)

Siberia â€“APA. U.S. and Russian communications satellites have collided in space nearly 790 km over Siberia. A satellite owned by the US company Iridium hit a defunct Russian satellite. Air Force Brig. Gen. Michael Carey, deputy director of global operations with U.S. Strategic Command, the agency responsible for space surveillance, said initial radar tracking detected some 600 pieces of debris. He identified the Russian spacecraft as Cosmos 2251, a communications relay station launched in June 1993, and said the satellite is believed to have been non-operational for the past 10 years or so. The reportedly non-operational Russian satellite, weighing 950kg (2,094lb), had been launched in 1993, while the Iridium satellite weighed 560 kg and was launched in 1997. Nicholas Johnson, NASA’s chief scientist for orbital debris at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, said the debris were not threatening the Intercontinental Space Station, which could avoid a collision with large fragments, but small pieces of wreckage could be a threat for the station.