Debris from a Chinese rocket is set to crash to Earth some time over the next few days, with the potential for wreckage to land across a wide swathe of the globe.
Part of a Long March 5B rocket China launched on July 24 will make an uncontrolled reentry around July 31, according to the Aerospace Corp., a nonprofit based in El Segundo, California, that receives U.S. funding.
The possible debris field includes much of the US, as well as Africa, Australia, Brazil, India and Southeast Asia, according to Aerospace’s predictions.
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Concern over the reentry and the impact it could have is being dismissed by China, however, with state-backed media saying the warnings are just “sour grapes” from people resentful of the country’s development as a space power.
“The U.S. is running out of ways to stop China’s development in the aerospace sector, so smears and defamation became the only things left for it,” the Global Times newspaper reported, citing Song Zhongping, a television commentator who closely follows China’s space program.
Read more: Fortune
