Posted on 04/02/2024 12:35:17 PM PDT by Red Badger
Space Junkie A sizable cylindrical object crashed through the roof of Alexandro Otero's home in Naples, Florida — and experts believe it may have originated from the International Space Station.
While NASA scientists have since recovered the debris and are currently analyzing it, Ars Technica reports, we still don't have confirmation that the 2-pound object came from space.
But given the evidence, there's a decent chance it once belonged to the aging orbital outpost.
Pictures shared by Otero on X-formerly-Twitter show the carnage, with the object punching through wood and drywall with ease.
"It was a tremendous sound," Otero recalled in an interview with local CBS-affiliated news station WINK. "It almost hit my son. He was two rooms over and heard it all."
Punching Holes
According to Ars' reporting, Otero's Nest home security camera recorded the sound of the object crashing through his roof, just minutes after the US Space Command recorded the reentry of a piece of space debris. Its orbital path also placed it somewhere over the Gulf of Mexico, making its way toward Florida, where Otero resides.
Otero may even have a case in trying to make a claim against the federal government to pay for the hole in his roof.
"It gets more interesting if this material is discovered to be not originally from the United States," Michelle Hanlon, executive director of the Center for Air and Space Law at the University of Mississippi, told Ars. "If it is a human-made space object which was launched into space by another country, which caused damage on Earth, that country would be absolutely liable to the homeowner for the damage caused."
The debris, per the report, may have once belonged to a cargo pallet that was jettisoned from the space station, reentering the atmosphere on March 8. The NASA-owned pallet, however, was originally launched by the Japanese space agency, which could complicate matters.
For now, we await word from NASA.
"More information will be available once the analysis is complete," space agency spokesperson Josh Finch told Ars.
Some people call me Maurice.
How does something like this survive re-entry?
Space rocks thump the earth all the time. Metal chunks would survive the fall.
Soon the government will be suing homeowners for putting their houses in the way of falling government property.
It’s not only space junk
crashing thru roofs.
Had a friend in Santa Rosa,
Ca. Who’s garage roof was
taken out by huge chunk
of blue ice. It didn’t
smell too good in the garage
once it started to melt.
😁..............................
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