Posted: Sun, Jun 30, 2024, 10:02 AM ET (1402 GMT)
A defunct Russian satellites has broken up in low Earth orbit, creating potentially hundreds of pieces of debris. U.S. Space Command said Thursday that the Resurs P1 remote sensing satellite suffered a breakup event around 12 pm EDT (1600 GMT) Wednesday. The debris from the breakup briefly caused the International Space Station crew to shelter in their spacecraft. LeoLabs said it was tracking at least 180 pieces of debris from the event. Resurs P1 is a 6,000-kilogram spacecraft that was decommissioned in late 2021 and is in a low orbit expected to decay by the end of the year. It was not clear if the breakup was caused by an event on the spacecraft itself or a collision.

Related Links:

•  SpaceNews article
•  New York Times article
•  Reuters article