The satellite launched by North Korea on Sunday is "tumbling in orbit," United States officials have said, as US President Barack Obama called the rocket launch a "direct threat to security" of the US and its allies.
The satellite had passed over the Levi's Stadium in California on Sunday, an hour after the Denver Broncos beat the Carolina Panthers 24-10 to win the Super Bowl 50, Martyn Williams -- technology correspondent for IDG News Service -- told the International Business Times India edition.
"It (the North Korean satellite) was flying along the northern California coastline and passed (over the Super Bowl stadium) at 8:26 p.m. (local time)," Williams said. The match had ended at 7:25 p.m. local time.
"It simply was a coincidence. The North Koreans are not steering the satellite, so it just happened to pass right after the Super Bowl," he told IBTimes India.
The Kim Jong-un regime, defying international warnings, had carried out a rocket launch on Sunday, and put an Earth observation satellite, which it calls Kwangmyongsong-4, or "Shining Star", in space.
This is the second recorded North Korean satellite in space, though the nation claims it was its fourth one.
However, US officials have said that no transmission signals have been detected from the new satellite, which North Korea called a "success," ABC News reported.
This finding is likely to further raise concerns about North Korea's rocket launch, which critics have called a pretext to test ballistic missile technology. According to experts, the technology used to launch a payload into orbit is also used to launch a nuclear armed intercontinental ballistic missile. There are concerns that such North Korean missiles could also reach the United States.
In an interview on Monday, Obama said that the US "is consulting with the South Koreans for the first time about more missile defense capabilities to prevent any possibility that North Korea could reach US facilities or US populations."
