ERS-2 satellite is a dead European satellite that will crash into Earth

After 16 years of operation, a defunct satellite will crash back to Earth this Wednesday at approximately 10 a.m. ET, says the European Space Agency, as of Sunday afternoon.

The Agency launched the Heritage ERS-2 satellite in 1995 after its sister satellite, ERS-1. The ERS-2 ended its mission in September 2011.

The space agency used the satellite to track the Earth's decreasing polar ice, shifting land masses, rising sea levels, warming oceans and changing atmospheric chemistry. Since the satellite's retirement, the agency has been slowly lowering its altitude.

The agency said its maneuvers "used up the satellite’s remaining fuel and lowered its average altitude from 785 km (488 miles) to about 573 km (356 miles) in order to greatly reduce the risk of collision with other satellites or space debris." The maneuvers also altered the satellite’s orbit so it would reenter Earth’s atmosphere within 15 years.

How big is the dead ERS-2 satellite?

The ERS-2 satellite is huge compared with other space debris. It's about as long as a city bus and weighs more than 5,000 pounds.

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The satellite is now low enough that the atmosphere will cause it to rapidly descend in the coming days. Because ERS-2 is out of fuel, the space agency can't control it with engine burns.

The satellite is expected to start disintegrating in the atmosphere about 50 miles above Earth. Some debris could crash into the surface, according to the space agency. But it's most likely any debris would land in an ocean, given that water makes up about 70% of the surface on Earth.

How much space junk is in orbiting Earth?

Orbital debris, also known as space junk, can range from defunct satellites – such as the ERS-2 – or small fragments of rockets or satellites. It can even be human waste from astronauts on space missions. The number of objects in Earth's orbit has risen dramatically over the past 30 years.

According to the European Space Agency, the overwhelming majority of untracked space debris is smaller than 0.4 inches wide.

Other types of space junk

Space junk isn't only space debris from missiles and satellites. Some of the more unusual items include:

How much space junk is there?

Since the dawn of the space age in the 1950s, humankind has launched almost 50,000 tons of material into space. About 10,000 tons remains in orbit, according to the space agency, which cited data from the U.S Space Surveillance Network.

Of the 16,990 satellites launched into space since 1957, about 9,000 of them – the majority of which remain operational – continue to whiz around the Earth at high speeds as of December 2023, the space agency says.

The chart below shows the number of objects in Earth's orbit cataloged by the Space Surveillance Network:

SOURCE European Space Agency, NASA, Space.com and McKinsey and Company

CONTRIBUTING Eric Lagatta/USA TODAY