Rocketship debris found in Manzanilla

PART of a rocket was found on Manzanilla Beach yesterday. 

The object was taken away for examination by the Trinidad and Tobago Civil Aviation Authority.

Police were informed of the sighting of an object at around 6 p.m. on Monday by a bather at a beach along Manzanilla/Mayaro Road. 

Senior Superintendent Othneil Williams and  ASP Sankar led a party of police officers to the scene at the 67 1/2-kilometre mark of Manzanilla Mayaro Road in the vicinity of Cocal Estate. 

Police said that it was too dark to search so they cordoned off the area and returned yesterday to find that the object had washed ashore.

Last May, debris from a rocket or satellite was discovered on a beach near Morne Diablo. 

The debris likely came from a spacecraft that lifted off in French Guiana on the east coast of South America, said Director General of the Trinidad and Tobago Civil Aviation Authority Ramesh Lutchmedial. 

Lutchmedial had said then that rockets from the French-based firm Arianespace are launched in French Guiana and stages of rockets would jettison into the ocean and sometimes wash ashore.

 He said that the debris was one of the stages that the rocket goes through and  was not harmful to the public. 

The last launch of a rocket from French Guiana was February 6.