Investigators say the origin of an object that reportedly collided with a United Airlines aircraft last week, causing damage to its windshield and minor injuries to a pilot, remains unknown.
The harrowing incident occurred last week on Thursday October 16, 2025, at approximately 6:44 AM MDT. The aircraft, a Boeing 737 MAX 8, had been traveling from Denver to Los Angeles when members of the crew reported hearing a loud bang as an object apparently struck the front of the aircraft.
Damage was quickly observed on the right side of the aircraft’s windshield, prompting a diversion to Salt Lake City, where the aircraft safely landed approximately 50 minutes later.
“Unfortunately we have some bad news,” one of the pilots was heard saying over the aircraft intercom according to Heather Ramsey, a passenger aboard the flight at the time of the incident.
“The aircraft has collided with an object,” the pilot told passengers during the announcement.
Ramsey, who shared her account with Fox 11 Los Angeles, said she overheard one of the flight attendants warning other members of the crew to move to the back of the aircraft and to immediately stop in-flight service.
“It was really scary,” Ramsey said, adding that she and other passengers were “holding our breath until the very end.”
The 134 passengers on board the flight were transferred to another aircraft once they reached Salt Lake City, which carried them on to their destination in Los Angeles.
Shortly after the incident, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) issued a statement saying the aircraft had safely made its way Salt Lake City, and that it was collecting information about the incident.
“The NTSB is investigating a cracked windscreen on a Boeing 737-8 during cruise flight near Moab, Utah, Thursday,” a portion of the statement read. “Operating as United flight 1093 from DEN to LAX, airplane diverted safely to SLC.”
The NTSB also said that the damaged windscreen had been sent to a laboratory where it would be examined to try to determine what the object that struck the aircraft might have been, as speculations ensue about whether debris from a spacecraft reentry, or even a potential meteor impact, could have been involved.
“[P]eople are starting to discuss what this might have been, and the ‘space debris’ (whatever that ends up being) idea is most definitely -not- being dismissed as a possibility,” wrote user JonNYC in a posting about the incident on X.
However, Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer with the Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, told The Debrief in an email that there were “no known reentry matches” that link the incident to any spacecraft falling to Earth at the time.
In an update on his website, McDowell noted that there had been three objects that were successfully tracked during reentry last Thursday, involving a Starlink satellite and a pair of Chinese payloads.
“All are ruled out,” McDowell wrote, confirming none of these three objects had been near the location where the object struck the United Airlines flight last week.
While space debris has seemingly been ruled out for now regarding the United Airlines incident last week, McDowell has nonetheless raised concerns over the rise in Starlink satellite reentries, which he says are occurring on a daily basis.
In a statement provided to The Debrief earlier this month, McDowell said that “considering also non-Starlink reentries, there is a risk from reentering debris that I am not comfortable with,” adding that he believes “we should move to banning uncontrolled reentry from large (1 ton plus) space objects.”
Dr. Siamak Hesar, an expert on space debris reentries and CEO of Kayhan Space, similarly told The Debrief that while it is uncommon for space debris reentry to reach flight altitudes, such events are not unheard of, although it requires the debris to be fairly large.
“The material composition also plays a critical role, as objects made from heat-resistant materials have a much greater chance of partially surviving reentry,” Hesar told The Debrief. “Smaller fragments or components made of lighter materials typically disintegrate completely in the upper atmosphere before ever reaching air traffic altitudes.”
Hesar added that the odds of such incidents occurring “are gradually increasing due to the growing number of satellites and spacecraft being launched into orbit.”
“Both commercial and government operators are adding to this population, and most of these objects will eventually reenter Earth’s atmosphere,” Hesar told The Debrief. “As a result, we can expect to see a rising number of reentry events in the coming years.”
While there are no known reentry events that are believed to have coincided with last week’s concerning incident, that still does not rule out the possibility that a meteor could have caused the damage to the aircraft. However, investigators have revealed no evidence supporting this potential source, nor any other possible links to objects falling from space at this time.
Following the incident, images circulated online which reportedly showed the arm of one of the pilots in the cockpit shortly after the collision with the object, revealing several lacerations caused by glass from the broken windshield.
According to a statement issued by United Airlines, the aircraft landed safely “without major injuries reported among passengers or crew,” which apparently confirmed the possibility that minor injuries had occurred during the incident.
Information made available in an incident report at the website of the Aviation Safety Network revealed that the aircraft windshield’s “laminated structure was severely shattered” and that the instrument panel and control surfaces within the cockpit “were contaminated with fine glass particles.”
“Visible impact damage was present on the external surface of the aircraft nose,” the report added.
Fortunately, the aircraft’s multilayer windshield is designed to be capable of remaining functional even in the event of damage being sustained to one or more of its layers.
Currently, while the investigation remains underway, the situation has been further complicated by the ongoing U.S. government shutdown, which has left many NTSB employees, as well as those employed with the Federal Aviation Administration, furloughed.
The NTSB says that it is “gathering radar, weather, [and] flight recorder data” in its ongoing investigation, but no additional details about the incident have been made available at this time.
UPDATE, 10/21/25: In a posting on X late on Monday, John Dean, cofounder and CEO of WindBorne Systems, a data company that collects meteorological information using weather balloons, stated that one of the company’s aircraft had likely been what collided with UA1093 last Thursday.
Dean said that he and his company have been in communication with officials who are currently investigating the incident, after the company’s own investigation revealed a likely connection involving one of its balloons.
“We learned about UA1093 and the potential that it was related to one of our balloons at 11pm PT on Sunday and immediately looked into it,” Dean wrote in a posting on X. “At 6am PT, we sent our preliminary investigation to both NTSB and FAA, and are working with both of them to investigate further.”
As of Tuesday afternoon, no official statement has been issued by the NTSB or the FAA regarding the possible identification of the object involved in last week’s midair collision.
Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.