If you are outside looking up at the sky at the right time, you can see a small circular cloud of light that will quickly grow to the size of a full moon, before fading away.
There is a fuel dump from a U.S. Space Force (USSF) mission that launched earlier today on a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V 511 rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
The launch happened on time at 2 p.m. The USSF's Space Systems Command has two satellites. The GSSAP 5 and 6 satellites will be placed directly to a near-geosynchronous position above the equator by the USSF 8 mission.
Atlas V rocket launches two satellites for the US Space Force.
The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket will launch two satellites on January 21, 2022. The image is from the United Launch Alliance.
The first of the two satellites will be released to its location in about 6 hours and 35 minutes after launch.
The Centaur second stage will dump its excess fuel into space after seven hours, 11 minutes and 40 seconds. The usual practice is to dump excess fuel. The fuel from the upper rocket stage comes off after satellite separation.
The timing of this event will allow for a sky show in the Western Hemisphere. When the Centaur releases its excess fuel, it will be at night in North and South America. The fuel of the Centaur will reflect sunlight as seen from Earth.
A satellite watcher has provided a lot of information about the visibility of the fuel dump.
Alerting observers and photographers! A fuel dump from a rocket may be visible to observers in North, Central and South America on Friday evening. The launch of the AtlasV rocket will take place on January 21st.
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Bassa thinks the appearance of the fuel dump is as big as the full moon on the sky.
Bassa said that the cloud should be visible to the naked eye and can be seen with binoculars or telescopes.
The fuel dump is scheduled to take place at 9:11:40 p.m. The time is 6:11:40 p.m. It should appear to the naked eye as a comet-like cloud about 10 to 15 degrees west of the bright bluish zero-magnitude star Rigel. Approximately one or one and a half fists to the right of Rigel is where the cloud should appear.
Satellite fuel dumps have been seen before. On the evening of August 12th, 1986, there was an event. Many people across the US and Canada were surprised by a fuel dump from a Japanese satellite launch that created a glowing cloud.
The fuel dump from the NRO-1 satellite was visible from the eastern US and Canada.
Why do you want to dump fuel into space?
What is the need to dump fuel into space? It is done to minimize the risk of an explosion of the vehicle, which in turn, would create a large amount of space junk, or orbital debris, that would endanger other space vehicles. The fuel is dissipated quickly and there is no environmental threat to the Earth.
At New York's Hayden Planetarium, Joe Rao is an instructor and guest lecturer. He writes about astronomy in publications. Follow us on social media.
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