Officials of the Department of Environmental Planning and Protection (DEPP) accompanied a SpaceX recovery team to Ragged Island where debris from the company’s latest Starship explosion was found in waters near that island.

DEPP Director, Dr. Rhianna Neely-Murphy spoke with ZNS News about the recovery efforts. She said, “the next step for is to continue to remove the debris that we find along the coastline and in the water. We ask that the Bahamian public if you see waste that you report it to the DEPP or to the hotline number that SpaceX has provided and we will come and remove it. We will also begin a more in depth marine analysis to see if we can find some of the larger equipment that may have sunken down to the bottom of the ocean.”

Dr. Neely-Murphy confirmed that the material from the aircraft is non-toxic to the environment. “We expect that the propellants would have been lost into the atmosphere. The methane as well as a liquified oxygen and so those should not be in our space anymore. Some of the pieces that we are finding are made of silica and so we are looking to see what is going to be the impact of these onto our environment as these pieces get smaller. But the immediate activity and the immediate action is to remove as much of them as possible so that we remove that long term risk from our environment.”

Falling debris from the explosion of the SpaceX Starship could be seen in skies over The Bahamas last Thursday evening.