what burns up as it enters earth's atmosphere
Theyâre the correct shape, theyâre coming in at just the right angle, and theyâre covered in an appropriate skinâ¦. Space may be the final frontier, but coming back to Earth after a visit to a planetary neighbor, or even a high orbit, can be perilous. As anyone whoâs seen the movies The Right Stuff and Apollo 13 knows, a spacecraft must reenter Earthâs atmosphere at a precise angle to avoid burning up or skipping back out into space. Well before the space program, astronomers were aware that meteorites burned up when they fell into our atmosphere. The reason, notes Allie Anderson, a graduate student in Aeronautics and Astronautics, is friction with air molecules (remember, thereâs no air in outer space).