NASA’s “Asteroid Hunter” Telescope Ends Its Life

To explore the night skies NASA’s sent into orbit a long time ago NEOWISE The infrared satellite named was pushed out of its orbit due to solar flares. At the end of this process, the satellite will burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere and disappear. The infrared telescope, launched in 2009, has been Nearly 200 celestial bodies had revealed.

NEOWISE’s last journey

NASA’s NEOWISE It was announced that the vehicle named (Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) will become unusable in 2025 due to increasing solar activities. The telescope’s orbit will become lower and lower over time. The solar flares that cause this situation will actually affect other satellites.

Earth’s atmosphere due to solar flares warms up and expands. Due to the expanding atmosphere, satellites are exposed to more friction. Satellites lose speed due to friction, deviate from their orbits over time and are pulled into the lower layers of the atmosphere. Since the atmosphere is denser in the lower layers, the speed loss increases.

On December 13, 2013 NEOWISE, which restarted its activities, played an important role in the discovery of many asteroids and comets in the meantime. This satellite, which studies near-Earth objects, was known for enhancing planetary defense strategies. NEOWISE Actually 2009 in the year WSE It emerged with the redesign of its mission.

On his first mission WISE map the sky The infrared telescope, which launched twice, was activated with a new mission after running out of coolant. The satellite, which would not be able to observe the coldest objects in the universe without coolant, was reassigned to observe objects that may be in orbit around our planet and pose a potential danger of collision.

successor to NEOWISE NEO Surveyor Work on it continues and it is planned to be put into operation in 2027.