Kenya investigating fallen space debris

NAIROBI (AFP): Kenyan officials said Wednesday they were investigating fragments of metal, believed to be from a rocket, that crashed into a village in the country’s south.

The issue of space trash has risen in tandem with increased spatial traffic.

Kenya Space Agency (KSA) said the object, a metallic ring roughly 2.5 metres (8 feet) in diametre and weighing some 500 kilogrammes (1,100 pounds), crashed into Mukuku village, in Makueni county, on December 30 at around 3:00 pm local time (1200 GMT).

The KSA, working alongside other agencies and local authorities, “secured the area and retrieved the debris, which is now under the Agency’s custody for further investigation.”

It said “preliminary assessments indicate that the fallen object is a separation ring from a launch vehicle”, which are designed to either burn up upon re-entry to Earth’s atmosphere or fall over uninhabited areas.

“This is an isolated case, which the agency will investigate and address,” the KSA said in a statement.

It said the object was not a threat to public safety, and praised the villagers nearby who had swiftly alerted authorities.

The KSA said they were working to identify the piece’s origin.

Past examples of manmade human space debris hitting Earth include part of a SpaceX Dragon capsule landing on an Australian sheep farm in 2022.

And earlier this year, NASA faced a lawsuit from an American family whose Florida home was hit by a piece of falling metal.

China has also been criticized by NASA for allowing its giant Long March rockets to fall back to Earth after orbit.