Something huge is about to smash into Earth

A huge Chinese space station is crashing back to Earth, although authorities say there is nothing to fear on the ground.

Authorities are well aware that China’s Tiangong-1 space station is doomed and will eventually end up crashing back to Earth. And there is some concern, however small, that chunks of it could fall in populated areas in Southeast Asia.

China’s space agency says that the chance that the decommissioned space station would hit somewhere in Thailand is only about 0.1 percent. Tiangong-1, or Heavenly Palace 1, is the first space laboratory ever built by China and was launched back in 2011 to carry out some initial experiments that would pave the way for a permanent Chinese space station on the order of the International Space Station sometime in 2023.

Authorities have been closely watching Tiangong-1 and trying to determine where and when it will collide with Earth. Right now, they expect it will happen sometime in April, so we’re only weeks away from the event. Authorities believe that most of its parts will burn up in the atmosphere, but some chunks could make it through and land somewhere near Thailand.

The following is an excerpt from Wikipedia on Tiangong-1.

Tiangong-1 is China’s first prototype space station,[9] serving as both a manned laboratory and an experimental testbed to demonstrate orbital rendezvous and docking capabilities.[10] Launched unmanned aboard a Long March 2F/G rocket[1] on 29 September 2011,[11] it is the first operational component of the Tiangong program, which aims to place a larger, modular station into orbit by 2023.[10][12] Tiangong-1 was initially projected to be deorbited in 2013,[13] to be replaced over the following decade by the larger Tiangong-2 and Tiangong-3 modules,[14] but as of November 2017 it was still aloft, though in a decaying orbit.
Model of the Tiangong Space Lab and Shenzhou manned spacecraft.
Tiangong-1 was visited by a series of Shenzhou spacecraft during its two-year operational lifetime. The first of these, the unmanned Shenzhou 8, successfully docked with the module in November 2011,[15][16] while the manned Shenzhou 9 mission docked in June 2012.[17][18][19] A third and final mission to Tiangong-1, the manned Shenzhou 10, docked in June 2013.[20][21][22] The manned missions to Tiangong-1 were notable for including China’s first female astronauts, Liu Yang and Wang Yaping.[21][23]

On 21 March 2016, after a lifespan extended by two years, the Space Engineering Office announced that Tiangong-1 had officially ended its service.[4][24] They went on to state that the telemetry link with Tiangong-1 had been lost.[25] A couple of months later, amateur satellite trackers watching Tiangong-1 found that China’s space agency had lost control of the station.[26] In September, after conceding they had lost control over the station, officials speculated that the station would re-enter and burn up in the atmosphere late in 2017. As of late November 2017, Tiangong-1 is approximately 290 km high and is falling to Earth about 10 km per month.[29] It is expected to deorbit some time in April 2018.[3]

In January 2018 NBC reported that Tiangong-1 is going 16,000 miles per hour (26,000 km/h) and is 180 miles (290 km) above Earth. The station has a high probability of reentering between 43°N and 43°S latitude, at an unknown longitude.

The Tiangong-1 was launched September 2011 with an intended service span of two years. After the last crew departed the module in June 2013 it was put into sleep mode and it was intended that it would remain in orbit for some time, allowing China to collect data on the longevity of key components before being commanded to gradually re-enter the atmosphere. On 21 March 2016 the Manned Space Engineering Office announced that they had disabled data service, since the space station had operated two and half years longer than its intended two-year service plan. According to the office, the space laboratory is under continued and close monitoring until it finally burns up in the Earth atmosphere.[4][24] Its orbit will decay gradually, and the space laboratory will eventually be destroyed by heat in Earth’s atmosphere between March and April 2018[68][69][70] Harvard astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell, among others, told The Guardian that parts of the craft such as the rocket engines are probably too dense and tough to be burnt up upon re-entry and may result in chunks of debris up to 100 kg in weight falling to the Earth’s surface, with little possibility of predicting where they may crash.

Tiangong-1 was not designed nor planned to be a permanent orbital station; rather, it is intended as a test bed for key technologies that will be used in China’s large modular space station, which is planned for launch in 2023.[12] Furthermore, modified versions of Tiangong-1, dubbed Tianzhou, will be used as robotic cargo spacecraft to resupply this station. The launch mass of the Tianzhou cargo spacecraft is expected to be around 13 metric tons (29,000 lb), with a payload of about 6 metric tons (13,000 lb).

In January 2018, The Aerospace Corporation predicted the Tiangong-1 will likely re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere sometime during March 2018. The corporation’s scientists also predict it will come down somewhere between the 43° North and 43° South latitudes with a high likelihood of an ocean landing of whatever did not burn during re-entry.

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