Here’s a bad way to end the year – a Chinese rocket booster crashing to Earth just metres from your house.
Shocking footage appears to show that not one, but both side boosters from a Long March 3B rocket fell over Guangxi, southern China, after the country launched two new satellites into orbit on Boxing Day.
The second was filmed by a resident exploding in a fireball as it landed in nearby woods.
The satellites were launched by China to boost its Beidou global navigation system, similar to the GPS used in Europe and the US.
Although not officially confirmed, both videos show the wreckage billowing reddish-brown smoke, which suggests the objects contained nitrogen tetroxide, used to power Long March rockets and a serious health risk to those exposed to it.
A yellowish gas emitted by the rocket metres from a building could also have been produced by a second rocket propellant known as unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH) mixing with air. It is also hazardous to human health.
According to the videos, first posted on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform, and later shared on X, the rockets landed in Baise and Debao in Guangxi. Spacenews.com reports the areas are consistent with drop zones for rocket launches.
Chinese authorities are thought to issue warnings and evacuation notices for areas at risk of space debris. A notice seen by Spacenews.com suggests these were in force around the Boxing Day launch.
And while several witnesses are filmed around the wreckage, social media comments suggest the residents could have found the debris on their return after being evacuated.
Europe and the US typically launch rockets at the coast, meaning debris will likely fall in the sea. However, because China developed its space programme during the Cold War, its main launch sites are inland, to protect them from attacks by the US and Soviet Union.
This means debris is more likely to fall overland, and possibly near people.
In 2019, a falling booster destroyed a rural home.
The space junk problem
With every launch, comes space junk. There is now literally thousands of tonnes of it orbiting the planet, from tiny specks of metal to entire satellites.
These can pose a risk to other orbiting objects and each other – when space junk collides, it multiplies.
But space launches also impact the environment here on Earth, with each blast off emitting tons of carbon into the atmosphere, and debris that doesn’t exit the atmosphere, or burn up in it, crashing back down.
Most of this happens over the sea or uninhabited areas, but as seen in China, that is not always the case.
Read more Space has a trash problem and nobody’s quite sure how to fix it
Last year a Chinese rocket showered Texas with debris after delivering spy satellites into orbit.
And in 1996, the first Long March 3B rocket failed just seconds into its maiden flight, destroying a nearby town and killing at least six people.
Two more Beidou satellites are expected to be launched in the coming weeks.
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