Space Debris Found While Snorkeling

A man stumbled across probable space debris while snorkeling on Cayos Cochinos, a remote island cluster off the coast of Honduras in Central America.

Mike Irmen and his family were visiting the islands when they spotted the debris conspicuously lying on the beach. The debris was labeled with the word “Ariane,” prompting Irmen to turn to Reddit for help in identifying it.

The mystery was quickly solved, aided by the identifying logo. A Reddit user named ColossalDiscoBall, who works in the field, confirmed that the panels were produced in Switzerland by Beyond Gravity (formerly RUAG Space) as part of the Ariane 5 launch system.

Irmen, an aerospace engineer from Dayton, Ohio, suspected it was the upper cowling of a rocket. He explained that the upper cowling covers the payload during launch and is jettisoned after leaving the Earth’s atmosphere.

The piece found does indeed seem to be part of the Ariane 5 fairing, a component of Europe’s main launch system from 1996 to 2023.

The European Space Agency explains that the Ariane 5 rocket fairing protected the payload during ascent, and was jettisoned approximately three minutes after liftoff once the launcher left Earth’s atmosphere.

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