Wired says we should think about staying indoors for a while, because the probe Russia sent to collect samples from the Martian moon isn’t going to make it that far. It’s expected to crash back to Earth in two weeks:
The spacecraft has been stranded in low-Earth orbit following an engine failure almost immediately after launch on Nov. 8. Efforts to contact the probe have proved futile and the Pentagon’s NORAD has reportedly projected that the vehicle will reenter the Earth’s atmosphere on Nov. 26, the day after NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory is scheduled to launch. (Wired was unable to confirm this date with NORAD due to the federal holiday.)
…
The probable fall zone is currently very large — between 51.4 degrees N latitude and 51.4 degrees S latitude, which includes most of the U.S., part of Europe, all of Africa and Australia and virtually all of South America and Asia — and could prove dangerous if the spacecraft were to come down over a populated area.
It’s a 15-ton spacecraft. Most of it will burn up. That’s *most*… not *all*. (They were carrying tardigrades to Mars too! That was a great mission!)
[via Nina.]