Satellite and rocket reentry
Everything in low orbit is slowly falling. This section covers how satellites and spent rocket stages come back through the atmosphere, what survives the trip, and the reentries worth remembering.
The altitude ledger
Reentry is a question of altitude. Read this from the top down, from the high orbits where debris lingers for centuries to the reentry interface near 120 kilometers, where the atmosphere takes over.
Communications satellites, and a graveyard orbit where retired ones are parked above the working belt.
Navigation constellations such as GPS and Galileo. Debris here can persist for centuries.
The most crowded debris shells: defunct satellites and collision fragments that will not decay for decades.
The International Space Station and many crewed missions. Air drag here is real, so the station needs regular reboosts.
Below this, air drag pulls objects down within days to weeks. Nothing stays up for long.
Where atmospheric heating begins in earnest. An object crossing this line is committed to coming down.
Most material burns up before here. Dense tanks and alloys sometimes reach the ground.
In this section
Reentry Watch
Recent and tracked objects coming back through the atmosphere.
ExplainerSatellite falling to Earth
How often it happens, and whether the debris is dangerous.
ExplainerWhat happens during reentry
The physics of heating, breakup, and what reaches the ground.
ExplainerNASA's ISS deorbit plan
How the largest object ever built in orbit comes down.
HistoryThe final days of Mir
The 2001 controlled deorbit that set the template.
HistoryThe 2007 streaks over Turkey
A reentry that lit up the sky and puzzled onlookers.
HistoryThe 2008 EAS tank reentry
A refrigerator-sized tank thrown from the ISS.