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Debris from Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket found in Polish backyard

Photo: Facebook/Z głową w gwiazdach
Photo: Facebook/Z głową w gwiazdach
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A warehouse owner in western Poland has discovered debris from the second stage of a SpaceX rocket in his backyard.

Adam Borucki was left dumbfounded after waking up to find the object resembling a burst tank lying by his fence.

Contacting the emergency services, police soon established that it had most likely come from the Falcon 9 rocket launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California at the beginning of February.

Police spokeswoman Anna Klój said: “The owner reported a large object about 1.5 by 1 meters, which appeared overnight despite the premises being locked.

Spokesman Andrzej Borowiak added: “Considering the fact that this morning over Poland the second stage of the Falcon space rocket was supposed to enter the atmosphere, we notified the State Space Agency.

“We are investigating the circumstances in which the item ended up in this place. The most important thing is that no one was hurt.”

The Polish Space Agency’s Space Security Department Team later posted on its website that it confirmed that “at night between 04:46 and 04:48, February 19, 2025, an uncontrolled entry into the atmosphere of a FALCON 9 R/B launch vehicle stage - object number NORAD / COSPAR ID 62878 / 2025-022Y - occurred over the territory of Poland.”
Polish science journalist Karol Wójcicki said: “This means that we were dealing with an uncontrolled deorbit - they waited until the object would enter the Earth's atmosphere by itself as a result of a slow decrease in speed and altitude.

“At around 4:49 AM, the second stage was planned to fly over Poland and it was then that it burned up in the atmosphere about 4 minutes earlier, which could be seen by the residents of western Poland.”

Space debris risk


While previous incidents of Falcon 9 debris falling to Earth have not caused injuries, SpaceX has improved its deorbiting procedures after a 2021 incident in Washington state, where a 1.5-meter-long cylindrical piece of a rocket fell on a private farm.
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