3 ms·
This one event? I'd be mildly surprised if it were even detectable, other than the brief fireball. There is a constant rain of meteors and meteorids - estimat
by toss1 5y ago
This one event? I'd be mildly surprised if it were even detectable, other than the brief fireball. There is a constant rain of meteors and meteorids - estimated 139/day more than 10 grams hit the surface of the earth every day [1]. I don't know how many more thousands of small bits burn up every day without ever coming close to the ground. So, I'd say it is at least far down in that noise.
Also, if the total mass of the satellite is a ton, vaporizing all if it in the atmosphere would make make a change of less than one part per 1000 trillion, considering that the atmosphere weighs, 5.5 quadrillion tons[2]. So maybe if it was all made of some element that is very rare in the atmosphere, it might get up to a 1-in-a-trillion concentration when it all burned up? But then, it also is now scattered all over so won't even burn up at once, so heavy elements from the first chunks may have already settled out from by the time the later ones arrive.
There's no way I can concoct anything that it is an atmospheric pollution risk. But space pollution, we might be talking Kessler Syndrome [3]; I don't think this will do it, but I'm worried.
[1] https://universeexplained.com/how-many-meteorites-hit-the-earth-every-day/ https://universeexplained.com/how-many-meteorites-hit-the-ea...
[2] https://www.britannica.com/story/how-much-does-earths-atmosphere-weigh https://www.britannica.com/story/how-much-does-earths-atmosp...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome