United Airlines Boeing 737 Max plane in flight, PHOTO: Robin Guess / Alamy / Profimedia Images
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in the United States confirmed on Sunday that it is investigating an incident in which the windshield of a high-altitude airliner was struck by an object while over the state of Utah, reports Ars Technica.
“The NTSB is collecting radar, meteorological and flight recorder data,” the federal agency said on Platform X, adding that “the windshield is being sent to NTSB laboratories for examination.”
She also specified that the incident occurred on Thursday, during a United Airlines flight from Denver to Los Angeles. Images shared on social media show that one of the two large front windows of a Boeing 737 MAX plane was badly cracked.
These are now everywhere so: pic.twitter.com/vBdotuYXae
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) October 19, 2025
Other photos show a pilot's arm with multiple cuts, apparently caused by small shards of glass.
Photo NOT confirmed Hearing there were scorch-marks, so space-debris or meteorites. THOSE HAVE TWO THEORIES
[image or embed]— JonNYC (@xjonnyc.bsky.social) October 17, 2025 at 9:39 pm
The origin of the object that hit the plane has not been confirmed yet
According to the first reports, the flight captain described the object that hit the plane as “space debris”. However, this has not been confirmed.
After impact, the aircraft landed safely at Salt Lake City International Airport after being diverted from its route.
The images show that an object hit the upper right side of the windshield with force, causing damage to the metal frame as well. Because airplane windows are made up of multiple layers, with a material laminated between them, the glass panel did not break completely. The aircraft was flying at an altitude of over 9,100 meters — probably around 11,000 meters — and the cockpit appears to have maintained its internal pressure.
Was it space debris?
Ars Technica notes that it's impossible to know without additional data. But very few bird species can fly at altitudes higher than 9,100 meters and Rüppell's eagle, the bird that reaches the highest altitudes, lives mainly in Africa.
Another possibility would be an unrecorded weather balloon, although it is unclear if its speed would have been high enough to cause the observed damage. Hail is also a possible culprit.
The only other possible cause of the damage would be an object from space.
That was the pilot's initial conclusion, but it's more likely to have been a meteorite than a piece of space junk. Estimates vary, but a recent study published in the journal Geology showed that about 17,000 meteorites reach Earth in a year. This number is at least ten times greater than the amount of human space debris that reaches the Earth's atmosphere.
Incidents of objects from space, such as meteorites or pieces of orbital debris, hitting airliners are extremely rare.
A 2023 report by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) estimated that a plane would crash from such an incident at 0.0007 in a year.
Most windshield damage reported in flight is caused by hail, ice from other aircraft, or structural defects, not space objects
