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The Chinese space station Tiangong-1 caused a sensation at the beginning of the year when it crashed on Earth in an uncontrolled fireball. Now, his successor, Tiangong-2, showed a strange behavior, which left the experts perplexed.
On June 13, the spacecraft fell from its usual 242-mile orbit to 183 miles before returning to its original position, according to Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who reviewed new data from Joint US Strategic Command. Force Component Space Command.
He tweeted: "OK now it's weird." The new data on Tiangong 2's orbit show it on the 390 km orbit after spending 10 days on the 295 km orbit. I wonder what it was? "
McDowell speculated that the unexplained maneuver is an indication that Chinese space authorities plan to desorb the space station in a more controlled manner than its predecessor.
"Maybe just test the engine's reliability of space after 2 years in orbit, as part of the end-of-life tests?" he wrote.
Phil Clark, an expert in China's space activities says SpaceNews that: "In part, China does not want a rehearsal of Tiangong-1 become thug."
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The old space station suffered a malfunction in early 2016 that resulted in a loss of contact with ground operators. While most of them burned during re-entry, with surviving debris landing safely in the Pacific, the spaceraft's demise was largely publicized.
Tiangong-2, which measures 10.4 meters long and weighs 8.6 tons, was launched in 2016. It was designed as a test environment for the technologies that will be used on the next modular space station of China, known as Tianhe. up to 100 tons.
According to McDowell, the propulsion system of Tiangong-2 could be the same as that of Tianhe, which will lead him to suggest that the last maneuver was conducted to collect valuable data on this subject.
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