Nasa Satellite Finally Plummets to Earth in Ball of Fire

'The Solid State Phased Array Radar is being tasked by the United States Air Force and the Royal Air Force to concentrate its radar energy towards the object in order to track its final orbit.'

'This information will then be used by various different agencies to predict the path of re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere.'

The 20-year-old Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite was the biggest Nasa spacecraft to fall uncontrolled from the sky in 32 years.

It was expected to break into more than 100 pieces as it enters the atmosphere, most of it burning up.

The heaviest metal parts were expected to reach Earth, the biggest chunk weighing about 300lb. It was thought the debris could be scattered over an area about 500 miles long.

Mr Legault's footage of UARS was captured through the lens of his Celestron EdgeHD 14in Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope in Dunkerque, France on September 15 - eight to nine days before its estimated re-entry.

Filmed at an altitude of only 250km, the body of the UARS is visible, as are its solar arrays.

Mr Legault told the skywatching website Spaceweather.com at the time: 'The satellite appears to be tumbling, perhaps because a collision with satellite debris a few years ago. The variations in brightness are rapid and easily visible to the human eye.'

The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, or UARS, ran out of fuel in 2005. Nasa spokesman Steve Cole said: ‘Anybody who finds a piece of the satellite should stay away from it and call the police and let them deal with it.

‘It could be very hot or it could be dangerous. It depends on what speed the debris is going, but it could go be going fast enough to go through a house.'

It was falling to Earth at five miles per second, faster than previously thought and experts said there was a one in 3,200 chance of someone being hit by debris – more likely than getting a hole in one during a round of golf. The 35ft Nasa craft was put into space in 1991 to monitor climate change.

In 1979 Skylab, which was 15 times bigger, rained charred chunks on the Indian Ocean and western Australia after Nasa said it would land in South Africa.

In 2003 when the space shuttle Columbia exploded upon re-entry killing its entire crew, large chunks of its shell landed across Texas.