Objects that crashed to the ground in China have been identified as space debris, state media reported, after a Russian rocket carrying a communications satellite fell back to Earth minutes after lift-off.
Qiqihar city in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang, which borders Russia’s far east, reported that several objects appeared to have fallen from the sky on Friday, the Xinhua news agency said.
One of the parts is a metal dome with jagged, blackened edges.
Space debris from a Russian rocket that exploded in the earth's atmosphere
have fallen in China, according to state media
After analysis, experts have concluded they were 'parts from a carrier rocket or a satellite', Xinhua said Sunday, citing the China National Space Administration.
Authorities were communicating on the issue 'with relevant parties,' it added.
On Friday the Russian rocket ferrying one of Europe's most powerful satellites into space exploded in the earth's atmosphere, setting the former Soviet state's commercial space program back 'three to four years'.
Russia's workhorse Proton-M was carrying the $275-million Express AM4R satellite when it failed and burned up, destroying the telecommunications module intended to bring high-speed internet to remote parts of the country.
It was the second failure for the Proton-M in less than a year, and the second time that it had failed to deliver such a European satellite, after the last one crashed shortly after launch in 2011.
Friday's unmanned mission went awry when the engine on the third stage of the Proton-M booster rocket failed, Oleg Ostapenko, head of the Russian space agency Roskosmos, told Russian news agencies.
He said the precise cause was unknown.
The failure occurred at an altitude of 160 km (100 miles), about nine minutes after the early-morning lift-off from the Russian-leased Baikonur facility in Kazakhstan.
The state-run RIA quoted Ostapenko as saying that the rocket and all debris had burned up in the atmosphere: 'We can say with certainty that nothing reached Earth.'
However, Russian media said some debris may have fallen into the Pacific or been scattered over Siberia and Russia's Far East.
No casualties or damage were reported on the ground.
The lost Express AM4R satellite, worth more than 200 million euros ($275 million), was described by its maker Astrium, a unit of the European aerospace group Airbus, as one of the most powerful satellites built in Europe.
Its loss delays a number of commercial projects by three to four years.
'It's a heavy blow, of course. And the thing is that our workhorse rocket - our most powerful and the most-used rocket - has such a bad record,' Ivan Moiseyev, head of the Russian-based Institute of Space Policy think tank, told Kommersant-FM radio.
He said the rocket had a 7 percent failure rate, and its unreliability was making it harder for Russia to compete in the multibillion-dollar global satellite launch industry, giving a boost to its European rival Arianespace and the American newcomer SpaceX.
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Metal apparatus fell in Qiqihar, northeast China's Heilongjiang province on Friday
- the photos were released today
After analysis, experts have concluded they were '
parts from a carrier rocket or a satellite', Xinhua said Sunday, citing the China National Space Administration
It was the second failure for the Proton-M in less than a year, and the second time that it had failed to deliver such a European satellite, after the last one crashed shortly after launch in 2011.
Friday's unmanned mission went awry when the engine on the third stage of the Proton-M booster rocket failed, Oleg Ostapenko, head of the Russian space agency Roskosmos, told Russian news agencies.
He said the precise cause was unknown.
The failure occurred at an altitude of 160 km (100 miles), about nine minutes after the early-morning lift-off from the Russian-leased Baikonur facility in Kazakhstan.
The state-run RIA quoted Ostapenko as saying that the rocket and all debris had burned up in the atmosphere: 'We can say with certainty that nothing reached Earth.'
However, Russian media said some debris may have fallen into the Pacific or been scattered over Siberia and Russia's Far East.
No casualties or damage were reported on the ground.
The lost Express AM4R satellite, worth more than 200 million euros ($275 million), was described by its maker Astrium, a unit of the European aerospace group Airbus, as one of the most powerful satellites built in Europe.
Its loss delays a number of commercial projects by three to four years.
'It's a heavy blow, of course. And the thing is that our workhorse rocket - our most powerful and the most-used rocket - has such a bad record,' Ivan Moiseyev, head of the Russian-based Institute of Space Policy think tank, told Kommersant-FM radio.
He said the rocket had a 7 percent failure rate, and its unreliability was making it harder for Russia to compete in the multibillion-dollar global satellite launch industry, giving a boost to its European rival Arianespace and the American newcomer SpaceX.
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