Remnants of China’s Long March 5B rocket land in Indian Ocean near the Maldives
- Remnants splashed down at 10.24am Beijing time, China Manned Space Engineering Office says
- US’ 18th Space Control Squadron confirms landing, no immediate reports of damage or casualties
The China Manned Space Engineering Office said the “great majority” of the debris burned up as it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere at 10.24am Beijing time, while the rest landed in an open sea area at 72.47 degrees east longitude and 2.65 degrees north latitude.
Those coordinates put the splash down in the Indian Ocean, close to the Maldives.
After the announcement, astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell, from the Harvard & Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics in the United States, tweeted that “it appears China won its gamble (unless we get news of debris in the Maldives). But it was still reckless”.
Space-Track.org tweeted that the 18 Space Control Squadron, an American operation that detects and monitors artificial objects in Earth’s orbit, confirmed the remnants of the Long March 5B rocket had fallen into the Indian Ocean north of the Maldives.
The US Space Command said on Tuesday it was tracking the Chinese rocket and that the 18th Space Control Squadron was offering “daily updates to the rocket body’s location” via Space-Track. The confirmed re-entry put an end to days of nervous watching by hundreds of thousands of people around the world.