Retired military weather satellite breaks up

Join our newsletter to get the latest military space news every Tuesday by veteran defense journalist Sandra Erwin. WASHINGTON — A defunct military weather satellite has broken up in orbit and created more than 50 pieces of debris, the latest in a series of similar incidents involving that line of spacecraft. The U.S. Space Force reported Dec. 19 that it had identified a “low-velocity fragmentation event” involving the DMSP-5D2 F14 spacecraft. The event took place at 9:10 p.m. Eastern Dec. 18 at an altitude of 840 kilometers, but the announcement…

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