Did a decommissioned NASA spacecraft crash in Kyiv, Ukraine? No, that's not true: The flash seen in Kyiv had nothing to do with the spacecraft, which did enter the Earth's atmosphere but nowhere near Ukraine.
The claim that a NASA satellite crashed in Kyiv appeared in a video (archived here) on TikTok by a user named jony.ori on April 19, 2023, under the title "Упал спутник NASA" ("NASA satellite crashed," according to Google Translate). This and other videos of the flash that was seen in Kyiv of the night of April 19, 2023, were shared widely on TikTok (here and here).
The head of the Kyiv city military administration, Serhiy Popko, initially said it was likely a NASA satellite that caused the flash over the Kyiv sky on their official Telegram channel:
NASA had put out a statement earlier on April 19, 2023, that they were expecting their retired Reuven Ramaty High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager (RHESSI) spacecraft to re-enter Earth's atmosphere at 8:21 p.m. EDT that day. NASA reported that the crash site coordinates put the debris of the spacecraft near the Sudan-Egypt border, according to astronomer Jonathan McDowell, who posted this on Twitter (archived here):
According to the US Space Force, NASA's retired RHESSI satellite reentered over 26E 21N (Sudan/Egypt border) heading NE over southern Egypt, at 0021 UTC Apr 20. pic.twitter.com/p5nTWLvFG1
-- Jonathan McDowell (@planet4589) April 20, 2023
Popko amended his statement later, stating it was not a NASA satellite. Details were not given but he said the people of Kyiv were safe:
