Approximately 66 million years ago, an asteroid named ‘Chicxulub’ hit the earth and ended the age of dinosaurs. Now, almost the same thing is about to happen when a Chinese rocket named ‘Long March 5-B’ is going to hit the earth somewhere at a speed of thousands of miles per hour. The only difference between the two events is the first one wiped out 99% of life on the planet while the chances of the second one causing a casualty or injury are 1 in 10000.
Long March 5-B Rocket
The Chinese rocket Long March 5-B was launched on 24th July 2022 to deliver the Wentian Lab Module to the growing Chinese space station Tinagong. It is 100 feet long and weighs 25 Tons (22.5 Metric Tons).
What Is The Expected Time And Location Of Fall?
Our latest prediction for #CZ5B rocket body reentry is:
— The Aerospace Corporation (@AerospaceCorp) July 28, 2022
🚀31 Jul 2022 00:24 UTC ± 16 hours
Reentry will be along one of the ground tracks shown here. It is still too early to determine a meaningful debris footprint. Follow this page for updates: https://t.co/SxrMtcJnj0 pic.twitter.com/CZRQBClOAg
Although the space trackers are doing their best to predict the time and location of the fall still it’s nearly impossible to provide the exact data because of the reentry speed of the rocket which is 17,000 miles per hour. However, according to researchers at the Aerospace Cooperation, the rocket will reenter the atmosphere at about 18:05 GMT, plus or minus 5 hours on July 31, 2022, and for location, there is nothing sure about, because a single minute of time variation would cause the change of 100s of miles in location.
Most Of The Rocket Will Burn Out In The Atmosphere
According to the Aerospace Cooperation, most of the total mass of 25 tons will not survive the fiery passage of Earth’s atmosphere, however, some 5.5 to 9.9 tons of the debris will still reach the earth.
This Is Not The First Uncontrolled Rocket Reentry On The Chinese Part
The big Chinese rocket Long March 5-B has already hit earth uncontrollably twice in the past two years. One of those hits was the April 2021 mission that lifted Tianhe, the Tiangong space station’s core stage — occurred over an empty ocean. And the other, in May 2020, scattered some rocket debris over West Africa, some of which apparently hit the ground on the Ivory Coast.
