February 25, 2009

NASA’s failure to launch

A new satellite whose purpose was to track the major culprits of global warming has crashed into the ocean just off Antarctica minutes after being launched from California on Tuesday.

The satellite was going to be part of NASA’s already struggling network of environment monitoring satellites. It cost around $280 million and was specifically designed to look into what happens to the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

Co2 is produced from the burning of oil, gas and coal. The satellite would have monitored how much of this is absorbed by plants, soil and the sea, leaving the amount that ends up trapped in the earth’s atmosphere and is a major cause of climate change.

The big question now is will NASA go for a second launch of a duplicate satellite, the cost would be cheaper than the original, and a decision will be within a few weeks.

Source [AP]