Debris from Elon Musk’s rockets is polluting Mexican shores and killing sea animals, local organizations say.
Fragments believed to be from SpaceX’s 9th Starship launch have been found scattered across Playa Bagdad, a stretch of coast near Matamoros in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas.
The discovered debris consisted of various elements, from small scorched shrapnel to 11 full air tanks, stamped with the letters “S,” “P,” and “X,” linking the findings to SpaceX.
Jesus Elias Ibarra Rodriguez, a local vet and founder of Conibio Global, a wildlife conservation group, made the discovery while monitoring the beach ahead of sea turtle nesting season.
They found what Rodriguez described as “millions of fragments” dumped onto the sand and floating offshore in the days after the May 27th Starship launch.
“Fishermen told us the amount of trash was growing,” Rodriguez told Channel 5 News. He also said they’ve started finding dead dolphins and fish, raising concerns that the massive launch explosions may be toxic.
Some of the wreckage appears to come from the Starship booster's extinguishing system, though SpaceX has not confirmed that. Playa Bagdad is about to host a major conservation moment. 10,000 endangered sea turtle hatchlings are scheduled to be released onto the same stretch of beach now littered with aerospace garbage.
“We need to quickly get rid of the trash before we start releasing sea turtles,” Rodriguez said. The group is searching for volunteers to help them clean the beach.
Rising concerns about killer satellites and trash
Since launching its first satellite in 2018, Starlink, operated by SpaceX, has grown into the dominant player in the satellite internet sector. It currently has more than 7,000 satellites in orbit and plans to launch 42,000 more by the end of the decade.
Scientists and regulators are warning about the broader implications of flooding low-Earth orbit with hardware. Concerns include space traffic, collision risks, and the long-term sustainability of satellite operations in increasingly crowded skies.
Some studies suggest that the scale of satellite debris is on course to give Earth its very own Saturn-like rings made up entirely of space junk.
NASA data shows that between 2020 and 2024, 523 Starlink satellites have re-entered Earth’s atmosphere. While some of those reentries were planned and controlled, many were not.
Not everything is burning up completely on reentry. Last year, a piece of a Starlink satellite was found on a farm in Saskatchewan, Canada.In 2023, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reported that Starlink satellites could injure or kill a person every two years and knock down commercial aircraft.
Scientists recently discovered that during periods of heightened solar activity, a Starlink satellite's operational lifespan can be shortened by up to ten days.
The company has acknowledged that some solar storms have degraded service and, in one notable 2022 event, wiped out 40 satellites in a single blow.
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