The Sky Is Falling (Or Is It?)

UPDATE: The FAA has backed off its claim that the fireball was connected to the satellite collision, so the mystery has been solved -- it was a meteor.

First there was the news last week that a U.S. Iridium communications satellite slammed into a defunct Russian military satellite, each weighing more than a thousands pounds and traveling at 17,500 miles per hour. The collision, taking place about 500 miles over Siberia, created hundreds of pieces of debris to add to the growing total of space junk. Then Sunday video was captured of a mysterious fireball searing across the Texas sky -- but apparently nothing has been discovered on the ground. Coincidence? A meteor or part of a satellite? It's becoming something of a space mystery and we'll have that story tonight on the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric.

There are reportedly about 18,000 objects larger than the size of a cell phone and as many as 200,000 particles smaller than half an inch just orbiting around the planet. Granted, most of them are at a very high altitude relative to the planet and don't pose a major threat to anyone in orbit or on the ground, but the space around Earth is getting very crowded indeed. It's something else for the NASA crew to think about when they travel to the Hubble space telescope in May to repair it since it orbits at closer to 300 miles.

It's so congested up there that space debris experts are meeting with the UN this week in Vienna, Austria, to discuss possible plans to manage to cosmic problem. Chief among the concerns: poor communication between countries tracking space debris, no standards or rules dictating how satellites or other objects should be returned to Earth (and safely), and worries about future missions to space that could be in jeopardy. It's not a problem that's going away anytime soon, especially as more countries launch satellites into space, including an expected attempt in the next couple months by North Korea.

In the meantime, watch out for falling objects, and stay connected.