While scientists held their breath, the satellite crashed
Western Australia's Nullarbor (meaning no trees) Plain is an arid, limestone plateau that lies east of the old gold-rush towns of Kalgoorlie and Coolgardie, southeast of Comet Vale and northeast of Grass Patch. It is a barren, almost unpopulated land of sand and saltbush. Out of the blackness of the southwestern sky one night last week, the fringe of this isolated region was visited by a fiery symbol of the Western world's most advanced technology: the final, fatal fall of Skylab.
Right in its path was Rancher John Seller, who was asleep in his house at Noondoonia Station, a 50-sq.-mi. sheep spread 480 miles east of Perth, Western Australia's capital city. Just 35 minutes after midnight, he and his wife, Elizabeth, were shaken awake by a loud noise. They ran outside. Said Seiler: "It was an incredible sight—hundreds of shining lights dropping all around the homestead. They were white, but as they began dropping, the pieces turned dull red. All the time there was a tremendous sonic boom."
Seiler could hear pieces of the disintegrating satellite swish overhead. Said he:
"It was like a windmilling sound, quite frightening. It terrified the cattle and horses, which circled their paddocks in fear. The dogs barked and went wild when the sonic booms followed. Then there were thumps—they must have been the biggest pieces crashing down. Finally, the house shook three times. Afterward, there was a burning smell."
The fireworks were almost as spectacular over Perth. At the airport, Captain Ken Fox and First Officer Lyndsay Walker were walking toward the jet they were to fly out as soon as Skylab was safely down. The sight overwhelmed them with imagery. Said Walker: "It was like Tinker Bell waving a magic wand. Like a fire sprinkler with sparks whirling everywhere." Said Fox: "It was as though someone had painted the heavens with a wide brush. There were hundreds of flashes in the sky."
Half a world away, the American space scientists who had sent Skylab aloft six years ago were calling themselves lucky, too. Although the 77.5-ton craft presumably broke into some 500 pieces, including two weighing about two tons each, there were no reports of anyone's being hurt. That was mainly because Skylab, pretty much on its own, had re-entered the earth's atmosphere while on an orbit that carried the craft over Canada, Maine, and the Atlantic and Indian oceans, posing minimal danger to the world's most populated areas. Despite months of meticulous planning for Skylab's final moments, officials of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration saw no reason to try to push Skylab into some orbit other than the one that was dictated by the laws of physics.