Jan 5 1983
From The Space Library
January 5-31: The Pentagon issued a warning January 5 that a nuclear-powered Soviet reconnaissance satellite had "run into problems" and would probably crash somewhere on Earth before the end of January. The Soviet Union's Cosmos 1402, like an earlier Cosmos that crashed in northern Canada in January 1978 and caused minor radiation contamination, was carrying about 100 pounds of enriched uranium to provide electrical power for its radar.
The Soviet Union confirmed loss of its control over Cosmos 1402, launched to observe U.S. naval operations from an orbit of 64.9° inclination that covered most of North America and all of China, Africa, South America, and Australia, as well as part of the Soviet Union. The danger lay not in the possibility of an explosion but in the radioactivity of the nuclear fuel core if the craft should come down in a densely populated area.
The foreign press had warned that Cosmos 1402 had "separated into individual fragments on a command from earth" The nuclear power unit aboard it was a matter of concern to all other nations; the United States had "expressed its concern to Moscow" that the object and its 100 pounds of uranium would crash on the Earth like the other. (FBIS, Xinhua in English, Jan 7/83; Pravda in Russian, Jan 8/83; Tass in English, Jan 15/83)
Normally said the United Press, when an ocean-surveillance satellite such as 1402 exhausted its 4-to-7-month life expectancy it would be raised and "parked" at a high orbit altitude "for centuries" The Tass news agency said January 7 that Cosmos 1402 had been "divided into separate fragments by commands from earth in order to isolate the active part of the reactor, which ensured its complete combustion in the atmosphere strata" Department of Defense (DOD) sources said January 10 that one piece had burned up in the atmosphere, but two larger sections were still descending-those holding the reactor, biggest and heaviest part of the 6,000-pound satellite. At the current rate of descent, the parts could enter the atmosphere in the week beginning January 23, sources said.
Tass reported January 24 that "the main part of the satellite structure" had reentered over the Indian Ocean at 1:10 a.m. Moscow time: the fuel core was forecast to enter between February 3 and 8 [see Feb. 7]. (NY Times, Jan 6/83, A-1; Jan 22/83, 9; Jan 31/83, A-25; W Post, Jan 7/83, A-21; Jan 8/83, A-11; Jan 11/83, A-9; Jan 20/83, A-2; Jan 24/83, A-1; Tass in English, Jan 7/83, Jan 24/83)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
