Rocket debris lights up skies over the Pacific Northwest
In this image taken from video provided by Roman Puzhlyakov, debris from a SpaceX rocket lights up the sky behind clouds over Vancouver, Wash. Thursday evening, March 25, 2021. The remnants of the second stage of the Falcon 9 rocket left comet-like trails as they burned up upon re-entry in the Earth's atmosphere according to a tweet from the National Weather Service. [Roman Puzhlyakov via AP]
Burning debris from a rocket lit up Pacific Northwest skies Thursday night, the National Weather Service in Seattle said.
"The widely reported bright objects in the sky were debris from a Falcon 9 rocket 2nd stage that did not successfully have a deorbit burn," the service said in a tweet about the astral occurrence that the Seattle Times reported was seen shortly after 9 p.m.
There were no reports of damage or other impacts on the ground.
The rocket delivered Starlink satellites, built in Redmond, Washington, into orbit earlier this week, the Times reported.
SpaceX said Wednesday that the Falcon 9’s first stage returned to Earth and landed as planned on its ocean-going barge off the coast of Florida.