Now a new confusion has arrisen: some news outlets and weblogs, e.g. that of Physorg, mistakenly link the event to last Friday's failed Russian launch of the Meridian satellite. Due to a rocket failure, this never reached earth orbit but crashed in Siberia within minutes after the launch.
As I wrote earlier, what reentered and was seen over France, Germany and the Netherlands last Saturday evening, was the 3rd stage of last Wednesday's Soyuz launch to the ISS.
The confusion probably comes from the fact that both launches used a Soyuz rocket. The failed launch that crashed in Siberia on Friday got some press attention because fragments hit a house in Russia (see a.o. here (English), with pictures of a recovered fuel tank here (Russian)).
But again: that failed launch had nothing to do with Saturdays sky event over Europe. The reentry over Europe was the 3rd stage of the earlier Wednesday launch to the ISS, that included Dutch astronaut Andre Kuipers.
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