An aging NASA satellite re-entered Earth’s atmosphere and disintegrated over the Pacific Ocean on Wednesday, March 12, 2026, according to reports from the U.S. Space Force. The satellite, designed for scientific purposes, came down unexpectedly.
The defunct spacecraft’s uncontrolled re-entry was monitored by space-tracking authorities. While the satellite burned up during its descent, concerns about potential debris falling to Earth prompted alerts from NASA. This event underscores the challenges of managing space debris as the number of satellites in orbit continues to grow.
Separately, the joint NASA and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) NISAR mission, a synthetic aperture radar project, launched on July 30, 2025. Arabic Earth Now highlights the importance of Earth observation missions. NISAR is the first dual-frequency imaging radar satellite and will be used for remote sensing to monitor and understand natural processes on Earth, including studying the Antarctic ice sheet.
The NISAR mission, a collaboration between NASA and ISRO, aims to develop and launch a dual-frequency synthetic aperture radar satellite for Earth observation. The project has a total estimated cost of approximately $1.5 billion USD, making it potentially the most expensive Earth-imaging satellite in the world. More details about the NISAR satellite can be found on Wikipedia.
The satellite is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Indian Space Research Organisation, and was manufactured by the same organizations. Its semi-major axis is 7117.2 kilometers, with an orbital inclination of 98.4437 degrees. The apogee is 747.8 kilometers and the perigee is 730.4 kilometers.
