China has continued to really separate itself from the United States and Western Europe and prove it is the true biggest and badest Super Power in the world. This can be seen on several different levels from how they have treated Hong Kong to how they even have handled the ever-evolving technology of blockchain and cryptocurrency. China continues to really try and wage economic war on those who try and oppose it or speak out on things that violate human rights. Australia is a huge example of this as they had a huge back and forth with China over how China treats both its people and foreign nationals in its country.
Earlier this week China launched the first section of its upcoming space station. China has decided to go ahead with this really by itself. With Russia leaving the ISS in a few years I would expect them to join forces with Russia to have a continued Low-Earth-Orbit presence. China though with its first launch has already committed a huge no-no when it goes to space launches.
China has lost complete control of the main stage of its rocket. At 21 tons and 100 feet by 16 feet, it is a massive center core or a rocket. While United Space Launches still has their main stages go up and be discarded into the ocean like this one was supposed to do most companies and countries are moving towards the reusability idea to save money.
Normally when the main stage is lost like this it is not that big of a deal because they are not the size that this one is. This stage is so massive that it is likely it will not burn up upon reentry and that is very very dangerous. With it being uncontrolled it could easily reenter over a populated area and rain down chunks of spacecraft. Not only is the idea of spacecraft chunks falling from the sky dangerous but it could be contaminated with toxic materials that if it landed in the oceans would be quickly diluted the same cannot be said for on land or populated areas.
Hopefully this massive piece of space junk lands in the oceans. The Earth, after all, is 70% water however it by some chance it falls on land and even worse lands in a populated area China will be in big big trouble. Countries do not take kindly to other countries dumping their garbage onto them and if it just so happen to possibly be toxic, rain from the sky and even over a populated area this could result in a nasty international incident. Due to the uncontrolled nature it still is not known really when it will return to Earth but once it does it will still be hard for scientist to track where it could land.
