After so much fear and so many (unfounded) alarms for Italy, in the end Tiangong 1 did no damage to our country. The Chinese space station that crashed to Earth was almost completely destroyed on impact with the atmosphere and fragments fell into the South Pacific Ocean. This was announced by the Joint Force Space Component Command (JFSCC) of the United States Strategic Command.
The re-entry into the atmosphere of Tiangong 1 (which in Chinese means "heavenly palace") took place at 2:16 Italian time over the South Pacific, according to data collected by the Space Surveillance network headed by the US Strategic Command, thanks to coordination with active surveillance in other countries, such as Italy, alongside Canada, Australia, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Japan and South Korea. The first Chinese space station thus concluded its history, after spending 2.375 days in orbit and 21 hours.
Tiangong 1 was launched in 2011 to carry out docking and orbiting experiments as part of China's space program, which aims to place a permanent station in orbit by 2023. Tiangon-1's reentry was initially set for 2013, but the His mission had been repeatedly postponed until it spiraled out of control. The Chinese press reported today that the global media emphasis on the station's reentry "reflects overseas envy of China's rapidly growing aerospace industry."
