Uncontrolled rocket debris expected to hit Earth soon. Could it land in the US?
Another large Chinese rocket body is falling uncontrollably toward Earth, U.S. space experts said, and is expected to hit soon.
The Long March 5B rocket was launched in China on July 24 to deliver a module to China’s Space Station, according to a news release from the Aerospace Corporation, a nonprofit research center funded by the U.S. government.
Now, the rocket body is making an uncontrolled reentry in Earth’s atmosphere, the release said.
Predicting a time and location of reentry is difficult, experts of the Aerospace Corporation said in a news conference on Wednesday, July 27.
The most recent prediction expects the debris to reenter at 3:24 p.m. EST Saturday, July 30 — give or take 7 hours — the Aerospace Corporation said on July 29.
The rocket body is most likely to hit in an area that includes 88% of the world’s population and a portion of the continental U.S, experts said at the news conference.
Aerospace Corporation’s most recent debris path prediction map showed most of the southern U.S. within the debris window.
Our latest prediction for #CZ5B rocket body reentry is:
30 Jul 2022 19:24 UTC ± 7 hours
Reentry will be along one of the ground tracks shown here. It is still too early to determine a meaningful debris footprint. Follow this page for updates: https://t.co/SxrMtcrMrs pic.twitter.com/dkSLKwkv9x— The Aerospace Corporation (@AerospaceCorp) July 29, 2022
The Long March 5B rocket is more than 175 feet tall and weighs more than 50,000 pounds, the release said. About 20% to 40% of the rocket body is expected to reach the ground, Live Science reported.
Debris will not fall all in one place, and experts expect the falling debris to hit water about 75% of the time.
However, falling debris from the same type of Chinese rocket caused property damage in Côte d’Ivoire, along the western coast of Africa, in May 2020, Fox San Antonio reported.
Because of the difficulty in tracking the trajectory of the falling debris, the impact area will not be pinpointed until an hour before the debris hits, Aerospace Corporation experts said.
According to Darren McKnight, a senior technical fellow for LeoLabs, said during the news conference that “your odds are going down in winning the lottery, but up in getting struck by space debris,” because of the increasing frequency of space launches.
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