A Paper Airplane Thrown in Space Would Orbit for About 80 Hours Before Burning Up

University of Tokyo researchers used a numerical model and wind tunnel to simulate an A4 paper airplane released from the ISS. The plane would orbit for about 80 hours, then plunge into the atmosphere and burn up on reentry, though a wind-tunnel test showed it could briefly endure extreme speeds and heat with some edge singeing. The study notes the low cost of paper planes could enable many deployments for small science experiments, but in practice it's probably impractical.