India's space agency is investigating space debris that fell in rural western India. The debris is thought to be part of a Chinese rocket that disintegrated and caught fire during re-entry.
The fall of the space junk coincided with reports of flashes of light in the skies of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh on April 2. According to an Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) post on Facebook, a circular metal object and a cylindrical-like object were found in an open field in Pawanpur Village.
"We were preparing for a meal together, when the sky blazed with red discs that fell with a loud bang on an open field in the village," said an unnamed woman, as quoted by Gizmodo, Thursday (21/4/2022). .
"People were running to their homes fearing there would be an explosion and remained indoors for almost half an hour."
The Hindustan Times reported that residents in Maharashtra were shocked after this rain of space debris and found various objects, namely six metal circles, metal balls and metal rings that fell from the sky. The metal ring that fell even had a diameter of up to 3 meters.
On April 3, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics expert Jonathan McDowell said the metal ring was suspected to be part of China's third-stage Long March 3B rocket.
The possibility that this space junk came from a Chinese rocket is quite high. On February 24, 2021, China launched the Long March 3B rocket and its third stage is expected to enter Earth's atmosphere in early April 2022.
What's more, on the same night, videos emerged showing a space object streaking over the Indian skies, suspected to be space junk that had just been re-entry.
The Indian space agency is currently investigating the wreckage, but their initial investigation indicates the debris is from China's Long March rocket. The full report will be published next week, and Chinese authorities have yet to comment.
If confirmed, this would mark the umpteenth time that Chinese rocket wreckage has returned to Earth and come close to causing harm. In May 2021, the core stage of a 23-ton Long March 5B rocket crashed out of control in the Indian Ocean.
Something similar happened in 2020, when the wreckage of another Long March 5B rocket rained down on Ivory Coast and damaged several buildings. Fortunately, no local residents were victims of this incident.