Why Did So Much High-Profile Junk Fall from Space Last Year?

Two well-publicized satellite falls a month apart got me wondering: Is this the new normal? After all, there is plenty of junk in orbit, and it can’t stay up there forever. And NASA, along with many other space agencies, now requires that satellites tumble back to Earth sooner rather than later once their useful lifetimes have ended so as to limit collisions in orbit

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Why Did So Much High-Profile Junk Fall from Space Last Year?