The mysterious fireballs have been seen in the skies of south Spain this morning, which has scared the daylight out of people. The dawn sky featured a frightening sight as people thought of a meteor shower. The videos and photos of the incident were circulating on social media until it was revealed by the experts that this might be “debris from a Chinese rocket” that was departing earlier this month. These bright fireballs, which are now believed to be debris from the Chinese rocket, were more visible in the northern part of Spain, which includes areas like Toledo, Madrid, and Valladolid.
Astronomers said that the fireballs disappeared after reaching about 60 miles (100 km) from the coast of Algeria and Murcia. José María Madiedo, of the Andalusian Institute of Astrophysics, explained that these fireballs are the result of China’s Tiangong space station mission. She further stated that the upper deck of the Long March 2F rocket was burst into space orbit and, as a consequence, the debris from the rocket has now entered the Earth’s atmosphere, which has become visible to the general public.
The Tiangong space station is a part of the Shenzhou 14 mission of China and, considering this, three astronauts were sent to the space station on June 5 through its Long Mach 2F rocket. These three astronauts were responsible for “completing in-orbit assembly and construction of the space station, as well as commissioning of equipment and conducting scientific experiments onboard”. Tiangong means “heavenly place”, and this space station project was initiated in April 2021 and consists of its own “life support systems” for astronauts in it.
However, the space station will become “fully operational” by the end of this year. It will be analogous to the “Soviet Mir Station,” which orbited the Earth from the 1980s to 2001. With its functional capabilities and state-of-the-art technologies, the Tiangong space station is projected to be operational for at least a decade. Moreover, it is about 100 miles higher than the International Space Station (ISS) and has a distance of 340 miles from the surface of the Earth.
Also, a similar sight of fireballs in the skies of New Zealand was seen a few days before when the boosters of Elon Musk dissipated the fuel in the sky, which resulted in the “glowing blue swirl in the night sky”.