- The metal object managed to survive re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere to hit home
- No one was injured in the incident, but damage was caused to the house
- Incidents of items of space junk making it to the surface of the earth are very rare
US space agency NASA has admitted that a piece of metal, jettisoned from the International Space Station (ISS) fell to Earth and hit a home in Naples, Florida in March this year.
The object, which weighted 1.6lb and was four inches high and 1.6 inches wide, crashed through two layers of ceiling at the house, but fortunately none of the occupants were hurt in the incident. NASA collected the object and analyzed it at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The analysis confirmed that the object had come from a cargo pallet containing ageing nickel hydride batteries that had been released from the ISS back in March 2021. The cargo had been expected to burn up during re-entry to the Earth’s atmosphere, but one piece managed to survive.
Homeowner Alejandro Otero told Wink-TV that the object made a “tremendous sound” when it hit his home. “I was completely in disbelief,” he added.
NASA added that the ISS will investigate the jettison and re-entry data to find out how and why the debris survived to make it back to the surface of the Earth.
Space junk often enters the Earth’s atmosphere and, in most cases, burns up there – this can sometimes be seen from the surface of the Earth as bright lights in the sky. There have been some documented cases of items making it back to the surface of the Earth over the years – famously, parts of NASA’s Skylab crashed to earth in Australia in 1979, which are now on display.
