Falling space junk WT1190F blazes on Friday the 13th
Event captured by astronomers from plane
A hunk of space junk nicknamed WTF fell to Earth in a blaze of glory early today — Friday the 13th.
The object, officially named WT1190F, entered the atmosphere south of Sri Lanka around 11:49 a.m. local time (1:19 a.m. ET) – during the brightest part of the day.
It was not visible from the ground due to cloudy skies, reported Paul Cox, host of Slooh, a U.S.-based organization that streams celestial events online.
But the fireball produced by the object as it burned up in the atmosphere was captured by U.S. and German astronomers aboard a Gulfstream 450 business jet specifically chartered to observe the event. The plane was sponsored by the International Astronomical Center and the United Arab Emirates Space Agency.
WT1190F, thought to be a discarded rocket body, was estimated to be about a metre in diameter. It was discovered on Oct. 3 by astronomers looking for hazardous near-Earth asteroids, but scientists later found it in images dating as far back as 2009.
Most of it was expected to burn up in the atmosphere, but any remaining fragments were expected to fall into the Indian Ocean about 65 to 100 kilometres off the Sri Lanka's south coast. That prompted the Sri Lankan government to issue a temporary no-fly zone and fishing ban.
