It's not every day that an object like this falls from space over land. (Image: Xataka.com)
The Kenya Space Agency recently announcedto host the first webinar of 2025 on space debris.
The background is the incident on December 30th last year, in which a large metal ring fell from the sky over the country. Luckily there were no injuries.
That's what happened
- What was found: As the authorities investigated the case in one Statement from 1 January confirmed, it is said space junk.
- Where it was found: The metal ring is in Nduluku in Makueni County landed, which is about 120 kilometers east of the capital Nairobi.
- Details about the find: The object, which is 2.5 meters in diameter, weighs about 500 kilograms. According to the authority, it is probably a separation ring from a launch vehicle that is used when launching main rockets.
Normally, such objects should disintegrate upon entering the atmosphere or land on Earth over uninhabited areas or the ocean.
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As the authority states, this is an isolated case that requires further investigation.
Excitement over hoaxes
As a result of the incident, a false report emerged a short time later, according to which Kenya had made claims for damages to India.
- The false reports have claimed that the object came from a docking experiment conducted by the Indian Space Research Organization.
- The latest statement from the Kenya Space Agency However, it says that it is not yet clear where exactly the object came from and that no official body in Kenya has ever made such claims for damages to India in the context of the case.
You can see a report on the original discovery of the object on NTV Kenya below:
Link to YouTube content
The latest launch attempts by SpaceX are currently causing a lot of excitement with regard to space.
You can find out more about this in the article We now know why the Starship exploded – and a space expert sees it as a problem for future SpaceX flights.
The Kenya Space Agency webinar mentioned above will take place on January 25th. Unsurprisingly, one item on the agenda is the incident in Makueni, more precisely demystified
should be.
However, whether this also means that we will learn more about the exact origin of the object remains to be seen.
