For those of you that were sleeping, you'll probably hear all kinds of reports about UFOs and Russian rocket boosters. Fact is this thing was big enough to be seen passing for several minutes over at least three western states. It appeared as 3 objects to most witnesses because of the extending sections of the space station, and caused power to go out in Nevada and Arizona. Our military activated their missile detection system and scrambled fighter jets all over the place. We'll probably never hear the true story from the Russians or even our military, but just put 2 and 2 together ...

http://cnn.com/TECH/space/9908/28/mir.farewell.reut/

http://cnn.com/TECH/space/9908/31/russia.mir.ap/

-- @ (@@@.@), September 02, 1999

Answers

You have a very odd sense of the word "fact"

-- b (b@b.b), September 02, 1999.

b,

Can you read? These are direct quotes from the cosmonauts:

Russia is trying to find funds to send another crew to man Mir, but the most likely scenario is that the trouble-ridden station will be programmed to burn up and plunge into the sea.

"There are chances to get the money, but they are minimal," Boris Ostroumov, deputy director of the Russian Space Agency, told a news conference in Mission Control after the landing.

"I would like to be more optimistic, but the situation does not allow this."

"And there always remains a threat of human error on part of the Mission Control, which may lead to the loss of fuel or loss of orientation," meaning controllers might not be able to guide its descent as planned, he said.

-- @ (@@@.@), September 02, 1999.

there's sure as heck SOMETHING going on tonite

too many independant reports of lights over the western part of the states......not to mention the lights going out in nevada and arizona at the same time these "lights" were sighted

hmmmmm

-- andrea (mebsmebs@hotmail.com), September 02, 1999.

And yet the concept that this was MIR crashing (which I do not deny it WILL crash sometime) is being worded in such a way as to make it sound like you this as a "fact". This is *your* specualtion that this was MIR.

I am coming to discover that things like "facts" though don't really seem to matter around here. Any old theory works

-- b (b@b.b), September 02, 1999.

Why do the conspiracy nuts all hang out here?.

Why would anyone cover up the MIR crashing, and more importantly does anyone think they could?

This place is going to the dogs.

-- mir-age (mir-age@showmethemir.com), September 02, 1999.

...more proof that Tinfoils can't get anything right...

-- Y2K Pro (y2kpro1@hotmail.com), September 02, 1999.

"Pro" - how thick a tinfoil hat do I need to shield me from falling Russian space parts? Last time I looked up, they were dropping radioactive pieces all over Canada from a previous spaceship....

To the question itself - best I know, the Mir itself is still in orbit, but will be abandoned "soon" and not refuled and "re-parked" in orbit. Thus, it will (but has not yet" fallen onto somebody's head.

Expect "big" pieces coming down. Not now, but later.

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), September 02, 1999.

I live in Northern Arizona. Power stayed on (no blinking alarm clocks) and checked the backyard for space station parts, none found. Arizona is pretty big though, may have crashed further north. I'll watch the news today.

-- Bill (y2khippo@yahoo.com), September 02, 1999.

Where can we read these reports? (nothing on AP or UPI or Reuters)

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), September 02, 1999.

I heard that the lights assumed a very tight, equidistant formation. At one point a light entered that formation, then left. At various other times, lights appeared to join, then appeared to separate. The glowing, sometimes sparkling, trails were reportedly generated from the tail end of the objects, as opposed to from the nose as one would expect with objects burning as they entered the atomosphere. Any attempt to "normalize" this anomaly should be viewed critically.

Discriminator

-- Discriminator (disc@orbit.sun), September 02, 1999.

Any possibility this could have been a result of the CME (solar flare) event expected that was to cause an aurora borealis effect? That could account for electrical probelms and the light show.

-- anon (anon@anon.com), September 02, 1999.

What that phrase, for educational use only?

http://www.vny.com/cf/News/upidetail.cfm?QID=108902

Russian space garbage lights up sky

Thursday, 2 September 1999 21:51 (GMT)

(UPI Spotlight)

WASHINGTON, Sept. 2 (UPI) - A large burning piece of a Russian rocket launched Feb. 28 re-entered the atmosphere over Oregon last night, lighting up the northwest sky - and the switchboards at United States Space Command in Colorado with calls from concerned citizens. Maj. Perry Nouis, spokesman for the Space Command, said (Thursday) the rocket piece was part of a Russian-built SL-12 and had been tracked so it's entry was predicted down to the time and place. Nouis said Space Command continually tracks more than 9,000 pieces of space debris as small as 6 inches long.

Copyright 1999 by United Press International

-- Jerry B (skeptic76@erols.com), September 02, 1999.

So it seems that some here are indeed afraid that the sky is falling.

-- And you thought pollies are trolls (hennypenny@skyfalling.con), September 02, 1999.