TIROS - Space Junk Series #05 Traditional Cache

There is always an imminent threat of "something falling from space"...

This series commemorates space junk that fell to Earth off various satellites during the past few weeks. Extreme measures were exhausted to FTF these marvelous historic pieces for your enjoyment before muggles got to them, so please treat them with awe and respect. All space junk pieces have been scrutinised for outer space viruses, bacteria, other contaminants, ionisized Psychlodinian dust and ear worm eggs. Those that showed any threat were incinerated for your safety, except for the SPUTNIK piece.... It is Russian. It does not want to melt...

Each piece also warrants some edification on its source

TIROS (The Television Infrared Observation Satellite Program)

The TIROS program was NASA's first experimental step to determine if satellites could be useful in the study of the Earth. At that time, the effectiveness of satellite observations was still unproven. Since satellites were a new technology, the TIROS Program also tested various design issues for spacecraft: instruments, data and operational parameters. The goal was to improve satellite applications for Earth-bound decisions

The TIROS program's first priority was the development of a meteorological satellite information system. Weather forecasting was deemed the most promising application of space-based observations

TIROS proved extremely successful, providing the first accurate weather forecasts based on data gathered from space. TIROS began continuous coverage of the Earth's weather in 1962, and was used by meteorologists worldwide. The program's success with many instrument types and orbital configurations lead to the development of more sophisticated meteorological observation satellites

TIROS 1 was launched 01 April 1960 atop a Thor-Able delivery vehicle on a 78 day operations period as the first weather satellite. The last satellite of the program - TIROS 10 - was launched 02 July 1965 atop a 3-stage Delta rocket and was operational for 730 days. TIROS was replaced with the TIROS-N/NOAA program between 1978 and 1986 and comprised 12 satellites, of which TIROS-N #11, #12, #14 and #15 are still operational today

(Adapted from contents credit to NASA)