Niël Terblanché
DEBRIS from the Long March 5b rocket plunged into the Indian Ocean just west of the Maldive Islands early on Sunday morning.
Experts said that most of the module of the rocket burned up when it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere after floating in low orbit for the past ten days.
Space agencies around the world have been tracking the 30 metre long rocket section since it delivered part of a new Chinese space station into orbit around the earth in order to issue warnings if it was going to come down over populated areas on land.
Last year, parts of another Chinese rocket fell to Earth and landed in the Ivory Coast where it damaged several buildings.
In this case, it was impossible to ascertain exactly when or where the booster part of the rocket would land. Namibia was one of many countries where the debris could have landed. The space debris entered the Earth’s atmosphere while it was over the Arabian Peninsula and fell into the Indan Ocean in the vicinity of the Maldive Islands.
The risk zone included mots of South America and parts of North America, all of Africa and Australia, the Middle East, parts of Asia south of Japan, and countries in southern Europe such as Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Greece.
The rocket booster is one of the largest objects in recent history to strike the Earth after falling out of orbit.
