1979: Skylab tumbles back to Earth

1979: Skylab tumbles back to Earth

The space laboratory, Skylab-I, plunges to Earth scattering debris across the southern Indian Ocean and the sparsely populated Australian desert.

On July 1979, the US space laboratory, Skylab I, plunged to Earth scattering debris across the southern Indian Ocean and sparsely populated Western Australia.
All week there has been mounting speculation over where the spacecraft would come down. It has been in orbit six years - for the past five of those it has been unoccupied.
Skylab's last signal was recorded at 1611 GMT. Less than an hour later a tracking station at Ascension Island in the South Atlantic confirmed the solar panels were beginning to peel off as the craft descended.
The 77.5 ton Skylab could break into as many as 500 pieces. The 5,100lb (2,310kg) airlock shroud and 3,900lb (1,767kg) lead safe, which protects film from radiation, are expected to survive the heat of re-entry into the earth's atmosphere.
Head of the Nasa task force monitoring Skylab, Richard Smith, said they had already received reports of hot debris, which had lit up the night sky, from several points in Western Australia.