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A large unidentified object discovered on fire in the remote Australian Outback has sparked a multi-agency response to determine its origin. The object, found by mine site personnel around 19 miles from the mining town of Newman on a infrequently-used access road, was initially assumed to have unexpectedly fallen from space.
Following its discovery, emergency services were dispatched, the area was blocked off, and West Australian Police began coordinating a “multi-agency response,” Daily Mail reports. West Australian Police, the Australian Space Agency, the West Australian Department of Fire and Emergency Services, and the mine operators are all involved int he investigation.
Authorities indicated the object “was made of carbon fiber and may be a composite over-wrapped pressure vessel or rocket tank, consistent with aerospace components.” The Australian Transport Safety Bureau confirmed that the object did not from a commercial aircraft. Thankfully, Western Australia Police stated, “The object has been secured, and there is no current threat to public safety.”
Leading space archaeologist Alice Gorman told The Guardian, “It seems to be the fourth stage of a [Chinese] Jielong rocket. There was one launched in late September. If it is the one from the 25th, that means it’s been orbiting the Earth for a bit and then came out of the blue.
“There was no indication it was going to re-enter right now so people weren’t expecting it – when I went to look for re-entry predictions I couldn’t find anything, which is an indication of the suddenness of it.”
“The object remains under investigation, though its characteristics are consistent with known space re-entry debris,” said a police spokesperson, adding, “Further technical assessment will be undertaken by engineers from the Australian Space Agency to assist in identifying its nature and source.”
Dr. Josef Aschbacher, director general of the European Space Agency, reiterated a concern about space junk becoming more of an issue to The Guardian – a concern that has grown as more and more rockets and satellites are being launched into space. His concerns echo a report shared last week pointed out that one to two of SpaceX’s 8,000 Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth every single day. That number could soon reach as much as five times per day when adding in the satellites being launched by Amazon’s Project Kuiper, those being launched into space by China, and other companies around the world.