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Transforming Orbit Into A Wasteland
I found an article (Yes, the article is now 404) in the CNN Space section this morning, talking about a recent report at a UN Conference on space. The author of the reporter alleges that programs like Star Wars and the like would basically turn LEO ? into a "wasteland" for satellites for decades or even centuries. And the wonderful part is that NASA's Off ice for Orbital Debris will close in October, due to budget cuts, despite 10s of thousands of already existing debris. Yah. Have fun with space tourism!Update: 04/23 19:14 GMT by H : It appears that the CNN article was pulled - I can't seem to find it - but Space.com had another report on the subject. And Space.com has also the updated story that CNN was linking to - and the update may be why it was pulled, because it appears that the Office for Space Debris may have some salvation yet.
I'm fairly convinced that if the military was planning on placing weapons in space, they would have thought this through enough to see this may be a problem. And, I'm also sure that they'll find a solution too.
If someone launched several nukes at the US, and the US (lacking an interceptor system) launched a retaliatory strike, would we give a damn about the condition of low earth orbit?
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"The author of the reporter alleges that programs like Star Wars and the like would basically turn LEO into a 'wasteland' for satellites for decades or even centuries."
The article actually said that if other countries responded to programs like Star Wars by dumping tiny bits of space junk (gravel, marbles, or the like) to destroy satelites, causeing more space junk and destroying more satelites, etc, etc then the result would be a LEO wasteland. Putting a satellite in orbit doesn't necessarily increase space debris. Attacking satellites in orbit, on the other hand, does.
-- Adam
NASA's Off ice for Orbital Debris will close in October, due to budget cuts, despite 10s of thousands of already existing debris
That office tracks particles LESS THAN 1cm large in space.
Anything bigger is tracked by another office in the agency, and funding hasn't been cut on that office.
May I just remind everybody that LEO is a HUGE place. Way bigger than the earth.
,very slim.
If you blow up a missile, the chance of a random space craft getting hit by a particle from the missile is very, very
It's not going to be a scenario where a missile gets blown up, then the particles from the missile damage all these other spacecraft, causing more particles to go flying, and LEO is turned into a wasteland.
Also, the vast majority of debris are small particles. These can cause damage, but they are unlikely to smash a spacecraft into tiny bits.
This article's forecast is a little too grim. Don't worry about it.
If you don't understand any of my sayings, come to me in private and I shall take you in my German mouth.
There are also a number of reports of the shuttle having to maneuver away from debris, such as here, its worth noting that the warning came from "U.S. Space Command", i.e. NORAD, not NASA's orbital debris office.
So some NASA PHB may think that NORAD's tracking is sufficient, and the money is better spent keeping the billion dollar dinosaur shuttle program flying...
It's a sad truth I have recently come to realize: Manned Space exploration as a major human endeavor is basically dead.
The left has no interest in it, since space exploration has no apparent humanitarian value. The right has no interest (outside of defense) since it's a money pit. And the private sector has no interest in it since there's no obvious way to make a profit from it.
If access to orbit somehow became cheap enough to be afforable to those who operate under different motivations and priorities, this might change, but given current aerospace and cultural trends I dont see that happening anytime soon.
Stop being paranoid. You are far more likely to be run over by a stampeding elephant outside your house than you currently are of being struck by space debris (assuming you were in space).
If you could collect all of the crap floating around in in orbit it probably wouldn't even fill a small landfill. You drive around in a car don't you? Rush hour traffic is a tad more congested than orbit is or will be in the distant future.
Those are great scary little pictures that they put up showing all the garbage forming a ring around the Earth. Of course those dots are probably 1000000 times larger than they are in real life, but they do a good job of scaring people.
Naturally these things need to be tracked but only for determining new orbits that need to be taken. By the time a cleanup is really needed technology will be able to present a viable solution. I don't see the point in spending millions/billions a year trying to solve it now and it certainly isn't worth losing sleep over.
So was this article pulled because it pointed out that anyone with the ability to launch a big enough rocket could potentially eliminate a large portion of the US military's advantage?
Just get an idea of the rough trajectory of LEO spy satellites, shoot up a rocket at the right moment, and blow up a modest charge to spray BB's into a wide swath of space.
Figure if you could launch just 1 million BB's and spread them out with a velocity of maybe just 60km/hr - creating a sphere 2km across in one minute, with a surface area of 12MsqMeter, you've got 1 BB for every 12sq meters, and if the satellite goes through both sides of the sphere and has a profile of just 4sq meters, you've got a 2/3 chance of holing it, maybe a 1/3 chance of severe damage via internal spray of debris over sensitive components.
And if you're a bit more sophisticated, you could launch those BB's into orbit. It might take days or weeks - but with that much new debris added to the same rough orbital altitude as a spy-sat, the chances of an encounter are pretty good.
Yep, I'd be worried about Iraq getting this bright idea - except after they analyzed their last war and the sort of tricks that the Yugoslavians played on us, I'd bet they've already come up with it.
I'd also hope the US is busily launching hardened spy satellites with enough internal armor and redundancy to take a couple of hits.
It'll probably mean the end of Commercial use of Space if they really go at it - the insurance rates for launches will be too high. Another good thing brought to you by the fine foreign entanglement folks in Washington. I sure wouldn't want to be on the sitting station - I mean space duck - I mean space station if/when Bush decides to go into Iraq.
On your first point ... the incoming missile, and and countermeasures are definitely on a ballistic (ie. non-orbital) trajectory. The interceptor almost certainly is also. So, even if the interceptor does work (hits the target), the vast majoity of the debris will follow the original trajectories and reenter almost immedietely. Some might pick up enough velocity in the right direction to achieve orbit, but not much, and very likely in an orbit that will reenter soon.
... The US is MUCH more dependent on space then anyone else on earth. I think many countries with the ability to reach LEO , or even high ballistic, would be willing to make that trade. Think of Iraq throwing up a SCUD full of bb with a crude upper stage (big shotgun?) in the path of the space station. Also, this would not really deny space to transiting objects like ICBM. They only transit this are very briefly ... a few minutes at most. So the odds of getting hit are low. Now if you are orbiting in this area 24/7 it's likely that it will eventually get you.
On the second point
When it rains, the sky isn't even *close* to being 100% filled up with water (or we'd drown, obviously), nor half, nor a quarter. But step out into the rain for a few moments, and you will get wet.
If you fire an Uzi in random horizontal directions on a crowded city square, the bullets take up an insanely small amount of space. I'd still be worried about getting hit, though.
The only difference I can see here is a matter of scale. While the odds that any bit of junk will hit anything are much smaller, you simply don't want to take those chances. And doubling the amount of junk in space pretty much doubles your chances of getting your satelite/spaceship hit.