NASA confirms object that hit Florida home was space debris

NASA on Monday confirmed that a 1.6-pound object that tore through a Florida home last month had been released three years ago from the International Space Station.

What happened? Last month, a homeowner in Naples, Fla., posted on social media that an object crashed through two stories of his home. He added that the object nearly hit his son. NASA confirmed on Monday that a robotic arm on the ISS had released a pallet containing aging nickel hydride batteries in 2021. Experts expected the pallet to burn up while entering Earth’s atmosphere three years later.

What sort of object was this? NASA analyzed the object and concluded it was a melted part of a stanchion used to hold the batteries in place on the cargo pallet released by the space station. NASA reiterated its commitment to keeping people on Earth safe while releasing debris from low Earth orbit.

Dig deeper: Listen to Harrison Watters’ report on The World and Everything in It podcast about how scientists used the recent lunar eclipse to study the sun.