The giant burnt fragment is likely part of the “trunk” of the Axiom Space Ax-3
mission
At the end of April, the owner of a plot of land in the province of Saskatchewan (Canada) discovered a charred giant fragment, allegedly part of the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft. Farmer Barry Sawchuk told the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix that while planting in his field, he came across a piece of debris that apparently «fell from the sky».
According to CBC News, the fragment is about two meters wide and weighs 40 kilograms. Although SpaceX has not yet confirmed whether the debris belongs to them, experts suggest it is likely.
Jonathan McDowell, who tracks space launches and re-entries, posted information on his X page that the storage compartment (“trunk”) from the Axiom Space Ax-3 mission launched on Crew Dragon entered into atmosphere over Saskatchewan on February 26. «It appears that these are the parts that were found on the ground», — wrote McDowell, who is also an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.
There was still deep snow in the province of Saskatchewan at this time of year, so Savchuk did not notice the debris before the start of the planting season and work in the fields.
If the discovery's provenance is confirmed, it would not be the first time a Crew Dragon fragment has passed through Earth's atmosphere. In August 2022, a fragment of «Dragon» was found in a sheep pen in Australia, which was confirmed by SpaceX and the Australian Space Agency.
During NASA's press briefing on the Crew-5 mission last August, Benjamin Reed, senior director of SpaceX's human spaceflight program, commented on the debris incident. He said there were no reported injuries or damage and the debris fell “in the expected region.” Reed emphasized that SpaceX works closely with NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on such issues, using validated models to predict and plan for such situations.
The FAA previously stated that «such fragments typically burn up in the atmosphere over the open ocean, posing a minimal risk to public safety».
Incidents involving the discovery of spacecraft debris on the territory of different countries are not uncommon. In April 2021, fragments of the second stage of the Falcon 9 launch vehicle from the same SpaceX were discovered on a farm in Washington. The Grant County Sheriff's Office confirmed that the debris belonged to SpaceX, but the company itself refrained from commenting on this incident.
Space debris, if it causes injury or damage, may be subject to a section of the UN Outer Space Treaty known as the Outer Space Liability Convention.
The only case when a claim under this agreement was brought occurred after the fall of the Soviet satellite «Kosmos-954» in 1978. with a nuclear power plant in the north of Canada. The costly cleanup of the environmentally sensitive area, home to numerous indigenous groups, required several years of work. In 1981, Moscow paid the Canadian government compensation of C$3,000,000, which at current exchange rates is about C$10,000,000 or US$7.3 million.