spacetoday.net: Chinese rocket stage renters over Atlantic

Chinese rocket stage renters over Atlantic

Posted: Sun, May 17, 2020, 11:07 AM ET (1507 GMT)
A giant Chinese rocket stage reentered harmlessly over the Atlantic Ocean Monday. The Long March 5B core stage reentered at 11:33 am EDT (1533 GMT) over the Atlantic off the coast of west Africa. The stage was left in a low orbit after a launch last week, and was the largest object to make an uncontrolled re-entry since the Salyut 7 space station in 1991. It's not known if future Long March 5B launches will leave core stages in low orbits for uncontrolled re-entries, or of this was a one-time event linked to the first launch of the heavy-lift rocket.