One of the salient characteristics of human industrial civilization is the large amount of waste, toxic and otherwise, it disposes.
Are oceans are filling up with plastic; near space is crowded with technojunk ranging from defunct satellites, spent rockets, to fragments. Man has been shooting objects into orbit since
US Person was in elementary school; understandably there is quite a build-up of detritus that could endanger future space missions. Now there is an effort underway to develop a capability to remove junk in orbit around the planet sponsored by a consortium of space companies, headed by the University of Surrey in the United Kingdom.
Last spring the group launched a Space Falcon 9 rocket carrying the RemoveDebris satellite to the International Space Station. It successfully arrived at the Station were it began testing technology used to capture debris. The satellite is supposed to launch its own debris in experiments intended to demonstrate capture of targets using a net or harpoon. It will also demonstrate navigational capabilities needed to rendezvous with targeted objects. When finished with its mission the satellite will de-orbit using a large drag sail. The mission is not intended to be a prototype of future clean up missions, but only a low-cost feasibility project.
 |
| based on actual data, size not to scale, European Space Agency |
The European Space program recognized that the proliferation of various types of orbiting systems used for navigation, weather observation and communication since the dawning of the space age sixty years ago poses a problem for the operational safety of future space exploration. Significant collisions have already occurred according to the director of the Surrey Space Center. Since 1957 when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, more than 5,250 launches have occurred creating more than 23,000 tracked debris in orbit. The situation is not quite as bad as depicted in the artist's rendition [right], but it gives the reader an idea of the magnitude of the potential danger posed by junk in orbit.
Three countries are responsible for most of the junk in space: US, Russia and China. There is evidence that fewer than half of the satellites put into space are commanded to de-orbit and incinerate in the atmosphere at the end of their usefulness. Even a tiny piece, such a paint chip, could present a danger to fragile, expensive equipment launched into space. In low Earth orbit, objects travel at
four miles per second, creating enough kinetic energy to impact with a force equivalent to a 550 lb object traveling 60mph.
