Six mysterious objects that washed up on north Queensland beaches might be 'space balls' - the kind left over from rocket launches, not the kind that spawned a Mel Brooks parody. The Australian Space Agency confirmed Sunday it's working to identify the objects, which police say may contain hazardous chemicals. The Queensland Fire Department reported five have been 'secured into drums' and a sixth was being 'rendered safe.' Local chip shop Forrest Beach Takeaway is already capitalizing on the confusion with a 'space junk snack box,' noting on a chalkboard that, unlike the debris, customers will actually be able to identify their food. Police insist there's 'no danger to the local community,' though the fire department warns more debris may appear.

Associate Prof Alice Gorman, a space archaeologist and junk expert at Flinders University, reviewed news footage and noted a lack of burn marks, suggesting the objects came from a rocket stage that fell back to Earth. 'They look to be consistent with what you find as part of a fuel system,' she said, describing them as pressurised fuel vessels made of titanium alloys. Gorman cautioned they might be marine in origin, but if they are space balls, they could contain traces of hydrazine - a highly toxic rocket fuel. She speculated they might be from a Russian Fregat rocket. Space balls, she added, are 'the most frequent piece of space junk,' with over 30,000 pieces of debris currently orbiting Earth. 'We've had more space launches in the last five years than in the whole of history,' Gorman noted, 'which means more re-entries happening.'