New Zealand was the only major land mass on its re­entry path.

　　Nasa says satellite debris scattered (撒落) over the south Pacific Ocean about as far away from large land masses as you can get.It says the US Air Force calculated the satellite entered Earth's atmosphere generally above American Samoa.But pieces of it did not start hitting the water for another 480 kilometers to the northeast, southwest of Christmas Island.Experts believe the metal pieces fell over an 800­kilometre span.

　　On Saturday, scientists said it was possible some pieces could have reached northwestern Canada, but Nasa said overnight that new calculations show it landed earlier than they thought, nowhere near North America.

　　Nick Johnson, Nasa's chief scientist for orbital debris, said the satellite had descended “well within” the range predicted (预测) by the Joint Space Operations Center (JSOC)．“This was not an easy re­entry to predict because of the natural forces acting on the satellite as its orbit decayed (轨道变形)．Some other nations around the world also were monitoring the satellite's descent in the last two hours and all the predictions were well within the range estimated by JSOC.”

　　UARS was launched aboard space shuttle Discovery in 1991.Nasa stopped using the satellite in 2005, after moving it into a lower orbit that cut its life short by 20 years.

　　文章大意：Nasa地图准确预测了卫星碎片的坠落轨迹。

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