The International Astronomy Center published two videos on Sunday showing debris from the Chinese rocket "Long March 5B" passing over two Arab countries, specifically over the Jordanian capital and over Oman.
The first video showed the debris passing over Amman, the capital of Jordan, approximately 10 minutes before its fall. The International Astronomy Center revealed on Twitter that the footage was taken by a member of its satellite re-entry monitoring program. The video, lasting about 42 seconds, displayed the uncontrolled movement of the tumbling rocket, which appeared as a white circle clearly visible in the clear sky. The second video came from Oman and shows the initial entry of the rocket into the atmosphere, according to the center.
On Sunday, Chinese authorities announced that a significant portion of the Chinese space rocket disintegrated over the Indian Ocean after entering the Earth's atmosphere in a random manner, putting an end to speculations about where the 18-ton structure would land. State television quoted the "Chinese Manned Space Agency" stating, “After monitoring and analysis, at 10:24 (02:24 GMT) on May 9, 2021, debris from the last stage of the ‘Long March 5B Yao-2’ rocket re-entered the atmosphere.” They added that, "The landing area is located at a longitude of 72.47 degrees east and a latitude of 2.65 degrees north," which corresponds to coordinates in the Indian Ocean. The same source clarified that most of the rocket disintegrated and was destroyed during the descent.
The "Space-Track" monitoring service, which uses U.S. military data, confirmed the rocket's re-entry into the atmosphere. They tweeted, "Anyone following the +Long March 5B+ re-entry can rest assured. The rocket has fallen." Experts had anticipated that the debris would land in the Indian Ocean, which covers seventy percent of the Earth's surface. However, the uncontrolled re-entry of a large body of this type raised concerns over potential damage and losses, even though calculations indicated that this possibility was low. Astronomer Jonathan McDowell from Harvard tweeted, "Reentry into the ocean was statistically the most likely outcome."
He added that China "seems to have won the bet, unless news comes in about debris in the Maldives, but that would have been reckless," according to AFP. Notably, Chinese media have downplayed concerns about the rocket's fall site while accusing the "West" of exaggerating the fears regarding the fall of the debris from the Long March 5B.
