SpaceX debris is falling from the skies.
Fliers traveling with Australia-based Qantas Airways have faced inconveniences over the past several weeks for an unusual reason. The flag carrier has been forced to delay its flights between Sydney and Johannesburg due to SpaceX rocket debris reentering the atmosphere.
The U.S. government warned Qantas Airways that the space debris was expected to fall over the southern Indian Ocean, but the airline claimed the information came too late. “While we try to make any changes to our schedule in advance, the timing of recent launches have moved around at late notice which has meant we’ve had to delay some flights just prior to departure. Our teams notify customers of changes to their flight as soon as we know it will be impacted,” said Ben Holland, the head of Qantas’s operations center.
Holland also mentioned that the carrier had to delay flights over the last few weeks by up to six hours due to last-minute warnings. The airline is also in touch with SpaceX to minimize future disruptions by sharing time windows and refining the areas of re-entry.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is responsible for the safety of space activity and also licenses commercial launches and reentries by American companies. Increasingly, flight operations have come under risk due to space operations.
Rockets are used to launch satellites, transport cargo to the International Space Station (ISS), and carry astronauts into space. Rockets are made of stages, each carrying its own fuel. As the fuel burns, the stages detach from the rocket, either burning up or reentering the atmosphere. Space companies try to ensure a controlled reentry within a designated zone, but in recent years, debris has often fallen outside the expected areas.
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On December 30, 2024, a 1,000-pound fragment of a rocket crashed into a Kenyan village. No one was hurt, and Kenyan authorities called it an isolated case. However, many similar incidents have occurred in recent years as rocket launches have increased. Last year saw 259 rocket launch attempts, with all but three being successful. This also means more debris is entering the atmosphere, risking collisions with villages, towns, and flights in their paths.
Last year, SpaceX’s Falcon experienced three such incidents when reentry occurred outside the designated zone. Also in 2024, suspected debris from a Chinese rocket fell over a village in China, leaving behind a trail of yellow, toxic smoke. In 2022, Spanish airspace had to be partially closed to account for Chinese rocket debris that was expected to reenter the atmosphere. That same year, the China National Space Administration faced heavy criticism after parts of a rocket booster crash-landed in the south-central Pacific Ocean.
These incidents didn’t cause any injuries or casualties, but in June 2024, a Florida resident’s house was damaged when part of a rocket fell through the roof, leaving a hole. Alejandro Otero was not home when the battery pallet from the ISS fell through the house, but his son was, though he was unharmed. The battery had been launched three years earlier by NASA, and the reentry location was supposed to be the Gulf of Mexico. Otero is now suing the agency for damages caused by the space object.
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