AN OUT-OF-CONTROL rocket component the size of a school bus has most likely crashed into the Moon’s surface by now.

Astronomers predicted that a rocket booster would impact the lunar surface at around 7.25am ET (12:25 GMT) after spending nearly eight years tumbling through space.

It was likely the first time a man-made object collided with another space body without being aimed there, but we won’t know for sure until two satellites orbiting the Moon pass over the potential impact site and photograph any crater that resulted from the collision, according to the BBC.

Bill Gray, the creator of the popular Project Pluto software for tracking near-Earth objects, was the first to notice the rocket component.

He reported that the junk was a SpaceX Falcon 9 upper stage launched from Florida in February 2015 by Elon Musk’s team.

Bill later retracted his claim, claiming that the rocket part most likely belonged to China. China has since denied the charge.