NASA confirms mystery object that crashed through roof of Florida home came from space station

Source: Associated Press

NASA confirms mystery object that crashed through roof of Florida home came from space station

Updated 6:55 PM EDT, April 15, 2024

NAPLES, Fla. (AP) — NASA confirmed Monday that a mystery object that crashed through the roof of a Florida home last month was a chunk of space junk from equipment discarded at the International Space Station.

The cylindrical object that tore through the home in Naples on March 8 was subsequently taken to the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral for analysis.

The space agency said it was a metal support used to mount old batteries on a cargo pallet for disposal. The pallet was jettisoned from the space station in 2021, and the load was expected to eventually fully burn up on entry into Earth’s atmosphere, but one piece survived.

The chunk of metal weighed 1.6 pounds (0.7 kilograms) and was 4 inches (10 centimeters) tall and roughly 1 1/2 inches (4 centimeters) wide.

-snip-

Read more: https://apnews.com/article/space-station-debris-florida-home-8c5cd89b0d9db0f5c274ab9ed1f0713c