Sfera (TEKh-44) was a small passive
satellite
A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...
deployed during a
spacewalk
Extravehicular activity (EVA) is any activity done by an astronaut in outer space outside a spacecraft. In the absence of a breathable atmosphere of Earth, Earthlike atmosphere, the astronaut is completely reliant on a space suit for environme ...
from the
ISS
The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), ESA (Europe), ...
in August 2012.
Description
Also called the Vektor-T calibration sphere, the satellite enables operators to track its movement, generate velocity and acceleration estimates to determine to what extent atmosphere is slowing down the sphere as it travels in space.
Drag (velocity deceleration) estimates are used to determine localized atmospheric density.
TEKh-44 is a shiny sphere 53 cm (20.8 inches) across weighing 14 kg (~31 pounds). "Sfera" is Russian for sphere.
Re-entry
It
re-entered the atmosphere in late November 2012.
Sfera-53 2
The second satellite, Sfera-53 2 (TS-530-Zerkalo), was launched on 14 June 2017 09:20 UTC,
inside the
Progress MS-06 cargo spacecraft on the
Soyuz 2.1a
Soyuz2 (; GRAU index: 14A14) is a Russian expendable medium-lift launch vehicle and the seventh major iteration of the Soyuz rocket family. Compared to its predecessors, Soyuz-2 features significant upgrades, including improved engines and a ...
carrier rocket from
Baikonur Cosmodrome Site 31/6.
It was deployed on 17 August 2017 15:29 UTC.
See also
*
List of passive satellites
List of passive satellites is a listing of inert or mostly inert satellites, mainly of the Earth. This includes various reflector type satellites typically used for satellite geodesy, geodesy and atmospheric measurements.
Passive satellites
*Cal ...
References
External links
Sfera deployed
Passive satellites
Spacecraft which reentered in 2012
Spheres
Atmospheric sounding satellites
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