Chinese rocket tracker - live: Falling spacecraft falls to Earth over Indian Ocean, reports say

If rocket debris landed over an inhabited area, it would be akin to a ‘small plane crash ... over 100 miles’.

Long March-5B rocket takes off from Wenchang Satellite Launch Center

The Long March 5B rocket, which carried a Chinese space station module, has dropped into low Earth orbit and now risks crashing back down.

The rocket successfully launched the Tianhe module last week, which will become the living quarters of the future Chinese Space Station (CSS). Unfortunately, the 30-metre long rocket also reached orbit, and is now one of the largest ever launches to make an uncontrolled re-entry.

It is uncommon for rockets to reach the velocity necessary to reach orbit, but it is currently travelling around the world once every 90 minutes, or seven kilometres every second. It passes by just north of New York, Madrid, and Beijing, and as far south as Chile and New Zealand.

There are fears that the rocket could land on an inhabited area; the last time a Long March rocket was launched in May 2020, debris was reported falling on villages in the Ivory Coast. The speed of the rocket means scientists still do not yet know when it will fall, but it is likely to do so before 10 May 2021.

Read more:

• Huge Chinese rocket falling back to Earth in uncontrolled reentry
• Chinese rocket falls back to Earth: what do we know so far?
• China’s falling rocket: what happens if out-of-control Long March 5B hits the Earth?

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Key points

• The 21-ton Long March 5B rocket carried a module of China’s new space station into low Earth orbit last week
• The speed of the rocket means it is orbiting the Earth every 90 minutes
• The Long March 5B core stage is seven times bigger than the second stage of SpaceX’s Falcon 9

[9 May 2021 02:06 · Andrew Griffin]

SpaceX projections put re-entry over Mediterranean Basin – but it could be anywhere

The Space Force’s latest projections put the middle of the window at at latitude 35.9, longitude 24.4, or in the Mediterranean Basin. That might have led to some fears that it could hit some countries in the area.

But that location is simply the place at which the middle of the window falls. There is no guarantee it will re-enter there – if it did so just a minute earlier, it would be almost 500 kilometres in another direction, and there is two hours of uncertainty.

[9 May 2021 01:46 · Andrew Griffin]

Map shows possible locations for re-entry

Here’s a map visualising the data from the Space Force, and showing where any possible re-entry might occur. Helpfully, and comfortingly, it also shows that there’s a good chance it will happen over the ocean.

[9 May 2021 01:27 · Andrew Griffin]

Rocket flying over Europe

If you’re near Lisbon, look out in 3 minutes – at half past the hour, the rocket will fly overhead, and you may be able to catch sight of it.

[9 May 2021 01:11 · Andrew Griffin]

Latest update from Space Force arrives

The latest estimate from the US Space Force is in:

It shows projected re-entry at 2.11am UTC, give or take 60 minutes. As such, the possible window is any time from 1.11am UTC to 3.11am UTC.

(That window opens in just under an hour.)

Space-Track notes that just a minute’s difference in the time of entry could change the final location by 470 kilometres. And there’s 120 minutes in the window, in all.

[9 May 2021 00:59 · Andrew Griffin]

Expert explains just how worried – and annoyed – you should be

Check out this interview with Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer who has also become the world’s most prominent Long March 5B expert in recent days – who explains how worried you should be, and why you should perhaps be more annoyed...

[9 May 2021 00:17 · Andrew Griffin]

Next Space Force update expected in about an hour

Space-Track, which is collating the expected re-entry information on behalf of the space force, says it is expecting a new update at about midnight UTC, or at the top of the hour.

That will be about two hours ahead of expected re-entry. (Though, as ever, there’s a big window – but the new prediction should narrow it.)

[8 May 2021 23:31 · Andrew Griffin]

Nasa also planning launch tonight

As with SpaceX, the sky is filling up with other objects even as the Long March 5B rocket booster comes back down. And if you’re in the Eastern US, you might even be able to see it. (You won’t be able to see the rocket falling from there.)

[8 May 2021 23:21 · Andrew Griffin]

Why do the predictions differ? It’s the unknowns

As you’ll find if you scroll down, one interesting thing is that the models differ fairly significant – even in the case of different organisations within the US. The middle of the window on the Aerospace Corporation’s prediction is about an hour later than the US Space Force’s one, for instance.

Why is that? Largely because of the things we don’t know, says the Aerospace Corporation, and how those unknowns are fed into their different models.

[8 May 2021 23:17 · Andrew Griffin]

Maps show possible impact locations

Here are some maps of possible impact locations, from Jonathan McDowell:

(Again, it could be anywhere on this path; the rocket’s journey is too unpredictable to know when exactly it might land, and without knowing when we can’t know where.)

[8 May 2021 22:48 · Andrew Griffin]

Where will the rocket land? We probably won’t know until after it has

The speed of the rocket means that it is very difficult to say where exactly it might land; even the smallest variation in its journey could throw it off by a major distance. And it’s worth noting that will be the case right until the end; trackers won’t know where it has landed until after it has hit the ground, though of course we should have a decent sense at least of where it won’t be landing by then.