Forecasting air drag with deep learning helps predict when uncontrolled satellites and rocket stages fall to Earth

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Researchers used deep learning to improve predictions of atmospheric drag and the re-entry paths of uncontrolled spacecraft and rocket stages. The article recalls the 2025 return of Soviet-era Cosmos-482, which Roscosmos said came down in the Indian Ocean west of Jakarta.

On May 10, 2025, a spacecraft built in the Soviet Union to land on Venus came home. Launched in 1972, Cosmos-482 was stranded by a failed upper stage of its rocket and circled Earth for 53 years. In its last days, several space agencies and research groups forecasted when it would fall, and therefore where. Roscosmos later reported that it came down in the Indian Ocean, west of Jakarta.