Long March 5B remains fall into the southern part of the Pacific Ocean

The rocket with which the last section of the Chinese space station was launched at the beginning of this week returned to the atmosphere over the southern part of the Pacific Ocean on Friday. A few debris have fallen into the Pacific Ocean, several hundred kilometers south of Mexico.

Most of the rocket was burned in the atmosphere, the Chinese space authorities reported. The decline was uncontrolled. As a result, China could not ensure that the fragments of the Long March 5B launcher would land in a place where there are no people nearby.

Shortly before the rocket returned to the atmosphere, the remnants of the rocket flew over Southern Europe. Therefore, Spain temporarily closed parts of the airspace. Switzerland was not in the danger zone; the missile parts did not come that far north.

This is the fifth time a Chinese rocket has crashed uncontrollably. The Chinese are facing a lot of international criticism. After the launch of a Long March 5B rocket in May 2020, a piece of the rocket crashed in Côte d’ivoire. In July, debris from such a rocket came down in Indonesia and Malaysia.

Russia and the United States allow returning missiles to crash into uninhabited territory or into the ocean in a controlled manner. Space company SpaceX even manages to land rockets in a controlled manner for reuse.

China launched the third and final component of its Tiangong space station on Monday. The module is called Mengtian, or ‘dreaming of heaven’.