Article Posted on : - Jan 12, 2012

An artistic illustration of the spacecraft.

MOSCOW (AP): Russia's space agency has predicted that the fragments of a failed Russian space probe could fall into the Indian Ocean, far away from any populated areas.

Roscosmos said Wednesday that the Phobos-Grunt's debris could fall between Saturday and Monday anywhere along a broad swath between 51.4 degrees north to 51.4 degrees south.

That includes the bulk of the land surface, but spares most of Russia's territory along with Scandinavia and a large part of Canada.

The agency said the mid-point in the three day window at 1448 IST Sunday when fragments could come crashing down correspond to a place in the Indian Ocean, about 1,700 kilometres west of Jakarta.

Roscomos said, however, that the forecast will be clarified as the probe's orbit draws closer to Earth.