On April 27, 2011, a Russian Progress M-10M rocket launched into space from Kazakhstan, carrying supplies for the astronauts aboard the International Space Station. It stayed docked to the ISS for nearly 181 days. On October 29, 2011 -- last Saturday -- it undocked, empty, filled with a half a year's worth of cast-off detritus. It performed a routine de-orbit burn, dropped down into the Earth's atmosphere, and disintegrated as it burned up at 12:54 UTC. But not before U.S. astronaut Mike Fossum took this incredible picture of it from space:
[Click to embiggen.] That shot is amazing. You can see the pieces of the spacecraft falling off as it rams through the Earth's air at Mach 25 or so. You're probably seeing the solar panels, antennae, and various other external bits being stripped off and leaving their own meteoric trails. In the case of resupply ships, the time and ...
