A mysterious object from “space” attacked a United Airlines flight over Utah
National transport The safety board confirmed Sunday that it is investigating a passenger plane that struck an object in the windshield mid-flight over Utah.
“The NTSB collects radar data, weather, flight recordings,” the federal agency said on social network X.
The strike took place on Thursday during a United Airlines flight from Denver to Los Angeles. Images shared on social media show that one of the two large windows in the front of the 737 MAX is significantly cracked. The related images also show the pilot’s arm being cut multiple times by small pieces of glass.
Object origin is not verified
Reports indicate that the captain of the flight described the object that hit the plane as “space debris”. However, this has not been confirmed.
After the collision, the plane diverted and landed safely at Salt Lake City International Airport.
Images of the strike showed an object hitting the upper right side of the window and showing damage to the metal frame. Because airplane windows are multi-layered and have laminate in between, the window glass did not break completely. The aircraft was flying at 30,000 feet (probably around 36,000 feet) and the cockpit was apparently maintaining cabin pressure.
So it was space debris? Can’t know without more information. Very few birds can fly above 30,000 feet. However, the world’s largest bird, the Rupel’s vulture, is mainly found in Africa. An unregulated weather balloon is also a possibility, although it is unclear whether it would have been traveling fast enough to cause the type of damage observed. Hail is also a potential culprit.
Assuming it wasn’t a Shohei Ohtani home run, the only other potential cause is damage from an object from space.
This was the initial conclusion of the pilot, but it is more likely to be a meteorite than space debris. Estimates vary, but a recent study in the journal Geology They found that about 17,000 meteors hit Earth in a given year. This is at least an order of magnitude greater than the amount of man-made space debris that survives re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere.
A careful analysis of the glass and metal impacted by the object should be able to reveal its origin.
This story appeared first Ars Technica.
