Some Hessians believe they have seen and photographed pieces of space debris. A satellite expert explains what the sightings are all about – and what’s really behind them.
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00:22 Min.
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09.03.24
|hessenschau.de
No space junk: plane with contrails over Frankfurt
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What was flying over Hesse on Friday evening? Some users of hessenschau.de pulled out their smartphone and photographed a tail in the evening sky. The assumption was that these were actually pieces of space debris re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere. Some believed they saw pieces of the ISS’s old battery pack in the sky.
Our editorial team has obtained photo and video material from Homberg (Efze), Aarbergen (Rheingau-Taunus), Frankfurt and Kirchhain (Marburg-Biedenkopf), and there are also some motifs on social networks under the hashtag #weltraumschrott – but the fact check is clear different image.
Sunlight at dusk makes airplanes look different
The Dutch satellite researcher Marco Langbroek explained on Saturday when asked by hr: All sightings – except those between 7.17 p.m. and 7.18 p.m. – were aircraft. According to Langbroek, the space debris was only over Germany at that minute and could have been seen. The alleged sightings each occurred at a different time period.
The Bundeswehr Space Situation Center gives a slightly different time: 7:21 p.m. At that time, the package was said to have flown from the west at an altitude of 139 kilometers over the middle of Germany.
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The scientist’s explanation for the special-looking photos is simple: When the sun is low in the sky during twilight, it still shines full higher up where planes are flying. This means that the contrails of the aircraft are particularly illuminated and are mistaken for re-entries of satellites or other material. This happens regularly – it is always mixed up.
Scrap looked more like a small flat “UFO”
The corridor of the scrap’s flight path was also over northern Hesse. The motifs available to the editorial team came from the Taunus, Central Hesse and the Rhine-Main area – with the exception of one in the Schwalm-Eder district. According to the Bundeswehr Space Situation Center, the actual re-entry of the old battery pack occurred an hour later – around 8:29 p.m. our time. Far from Hesse, via Yucatan in the Caribbean.
Corridor over Hesse Space debris from the ISS: All clear and no abnormalities
There were no complications when an old ISS battery pack re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere. A corridor lay over northern Hesse. The police in Hesse did not receive any calls.
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And what did the space debris actually look like in the sky? Satellite researcher Langbroek managed to take a photo of it in the Netherlands. The scrap looks more like a small, flat disc – almost like a UFO, but nothing that leaves any special streaks in the sky. The scientist published his snapshot on the X platform.
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When asked by HR, the police in northern Hesse did not report any particular observations or calls from excited residents. The Federal Office had already considered a danger to Germany to be unlikely in advance, as the battery pack was expected to disintegrate upon entering the atmosphere.
Published on 3/9/24 at 3:50 p.m