Tuesday 2 August 2022 04:42 PM Giant 16-foot-long metal fragment found in Indonesia believed to be debris from ... trends now
A giant piece of metal found outside an Indonesian village is believed to be part of China’s out-of-control Long March 5B rocket that plummeted through the atmosphere on Sunday.
Officials found the charred fragment Monday after residents of Pengadang reported hearing 'a loud roar from the sky' around midnight local time. The area is now closed off to the public in fear the metal is radioactive.
The object measures 16 feet long and seven feet wide, and appears to be light weight as a video shows a single man able to pick it up off the ground.
Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, told DailyMail.com: 'This is one of the domed ends of the propellant tanks. No doubt in my mind that this is part of the Chinese rocket stage.
'Also, it was found exactly on the reentry path, which adds credibility.'
Scroll down for videos
Residents of the Pengadang reported hearing 'a loud roar from the sky' around midnight local time. Officials later found a large piece of metal laying on the ground
The Long March 5B rocket launched July 24 to deliver the Wentian module to China's Tiangong Space Station, which the nation hopes to finish by the end of this year.
It is expected to have a mass between 180,000 and 220,000 pounds – roughly one-fifth the mass of the International Space Station, which is 925,335 pounds.
Although the module was successfully delivered, the 25-ton core stage did not have a set return spot and fell back to Earth.
Because the booster stage raced around Earth's orbit every 90 minutes, the exact point it would plunge from the sky had been impossible to predict.
" class="c7" scrolling="no"
An astronomer with Harvard University told DailyMail.com that it is part of the propellant tank
The Long March 5B rocket launched July 24 (pictured) to deliver the Wentian module to China's Tiangong Space Station
Fortunately most of the rocket burned up in the atmosphere, but up to 40 percent of it was predicted to survive the
