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NASA Warns of Cluttered Space
Ant wrote to mention a National Geographic article looking at the cluttered nature of Near-Earth Orbit. From the article: "Since the launch of the Soviet Union's Sputnik I satellite in 1957, humans have been generating space junk. The U.S. Space Surveillance Network is currently tracking over 13,000 human-made objects larger than four inches (ten centimeters) in diameter orbiting the Earth. These include both operational spacecraft and debris such as derelict rocket bodies. 'Of the 13,000 objects, over 40 percent came from breakups of both spacecraft and rocket bodies,'Johnson said."
Currently, and since its conception, the world's space programs have been based on the model that we can just leave shit we don't need in space. Where were the great minds of NASA to say "Wait...what is going to happen with the rocket parts we are leaving out there." We already knew of gravity and orbits, so the idea that perhaps the stuff would just fly away doesn't seem plausible.
Us as a race, and us as the most influential countries, must look to the future, and I do see improvements, however many issues as well. We do not live in a one generation world, this is a place which we must sustain indefinately (until we find a new host planet of course).
do.what.promptcmds
The key to solving this problem is to not look on it as a problem at all, but rather, as an opportunity. 'Space junk' is a bit of a misnomer....the only reason it's considered 'junk' is because no one has figured out a way to collect and reuse it. When they do, the name will change to something more along the lines of 'space salvage'.
Certainly, some types of space salvage (derelict rockets, satellite fragments, etc.) will have a higher value than others (paint flecks, rocket slag, etc.), but even the lowliest dist speck will have value, for the simple reason that it is there. Considerable time, money, and energy was invested is putting all this 'junk' into orbit, and before we blithely start to squander more time, money, and energy deorbiting them, perhaps we should consider the possibility of putting them to use where they are now.
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
I really think it matters if we use space as a garbage dump, there's still more space!
Good karma sticks to me like velcro on a piece of plexiglass.
Move along, citizen.
Space.com has a breakdown of responsibility by country of some of the larger debris in space.
And if you're really hardcore into space debris (it's hard to even type that without laughing), Orbital Debris Quarterly News is your magazine!
My work here is dung.
A big laser mop, that's all I need.
Make everything heavier, so it will float back to earth quickly.
Or, make it lighter and 'launch' it at the sun, the great incenerator in the sky.
Yeah, I know, so don't bother telling me...
Do not meddle in the affairs of sysadmins, for they are subtle, and quick to anger.
Try ritalin.
Seems like you would have to collect everything into a big ball and then leave the ball up there. I can't imagine dragging a bunch of junk down through the atmosphere. One big ball of junk would be much easier to dodge than thousands of small (probably equally deadly) chunks.
FoundNews.com - get paid to blog.,
You'd think these things would have been more thought out in the past, but judging by the shortsidedness of the current global warming fun (it was almost 70 in St. Louis yesterday) it isn't surprising. Seeing as how the last space shuttle disaster was caused by something hitting it, you'd think this would be a big risk, but it's a big sky and that's why they're monitoring those things. But hell, it'd keep me awake if I were on the shuttle/space station, most of that 'junk' is likely moving at a good clip, and what about things smaller than 4"? Are these 'rogue' things out there moving faster than a bullet headed towards the delecate skin of a ship? Hope they get it solved before the put the Howard Johnson hotel up there, can't wait for that! ;)
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Java based orbit tracker courtesy of NASA:
3 D.html
http://science.nasa.gov/Realtime/JTrack/3D/JTrack
Coding with assembly is like playing with Legos. Coding an application in assembly is like building a car with Legos.
You should see the pile of quantum foam I cleaned out of my ears last night!
"NASA Warns of Cluttered Space"--they've seen my office?
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
All we need is someone to "builds a space ship from his scrap pile in order to retreive valuable parts left on the moon" and in space by Astronauts, the kind of thing you might find in a tv show.
"The enforced labor works with the prison system on highways, why can't it work in space?"
Because the crime rate might skyrocket when people try to get thrown into jai^H^H^H space?
Ok. I don't think my karma can take any more bad puns... :-P
I'll take the job, as long as they send Betty1 and Betty2 along!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Alright everyone, I'm sure we can figure out how to solve this problem in our spare time between meetings and system rebuilds. After all, there's no problem NASA thinks is insurmountable that we can't convince ourselves is easily solved.
Why reinvent the wheel? Just ask the NSA if you can use theirs.
If the objects are in near-earth orbit, then at some point it the future their orbits should all decay into the earth's atmosphere, at which point they will incinerate themselves. Sounds like a self-correcting problem to me! The only question is: when? Anybody have any guesses on how long it will take all this junk to deorbit if we just leave it alone?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
I couldn't RTFA from my PDA. Are there private companies working on machines to try to capture these items? I'm sure it would be too expensive to ship back down to earth, but I wouldn't doubt that the raw materials might be worthy in a future moon or mars base.
It sounds like there might be some very valuable materials already in orbit, considering the cost to take up new materials on a launch. I'd love to see "the race to space" be over a bunch of competitive companies working to reclaim and reuse the junk.
I'll make a wild guess that, not many people will care about this problem for a loooong while, until a disasterous space accident is caused by space debris. And then there'll be ridiculous attempts to alleviate the problem, such as a 'kyoto protocol' of space debris, which won't be ratified by guess who. Who's with me?
On 2006 January 5, Slashdot reported that Washington is working to develop warp engines.
Perhaps, now would be the right time to work on developing shields. They could protect starships from both phasers and space garbage. Is anyone developing shields?
Send the World's Biggest Magnet to orbit round the Earth! (Remember to attatch some politicians to it in order to clean both Earth and near Space)
My 0.02 cents
For example, the EU is now setting up it's own system of GPS satellites. How long until global politics force other countries like China, India, Korea, Japan, etc to put their own systems in place to ensure GPS access during troubled times? Plus communications continue to evolve towards satellite based systems for various reasons and as more countries reach 1st-class tech status they will want their own resources. The idea is that eventually without a specific system in place to mitigate risk humanity could doom itself to staying planetside for generations while we wait for junk to reenter the atmo, or be collected by robots or something.
Maybe now is the time to come up with some plans for the future to do more than just track space junk, and in fact move on to collecting, dispersing, or destroying it.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
Certainly, some types of space salvage (derelict rockets, satellite fragments, etc.) will have a higher value than others (paint flecks, rocket slag, etc.), but even the lowliest dist speck will have value, for the simple reason that it is there.
r ktpow.html. Great. You got your first piece. Now you have to change heading and velocity to intercept piece #2. These vectors aren't all heading in the same direction at the same location. And they are only tracking about 13,000 pieces in NEO ... that's not very many pieces given the vast area of space there is! Consider 13,000 random objects on the surface of the earth, now extend it upwards a hundred meters, and add a volume of 1000m in the vertical direction. Long story short, you can't turn a profit given the fact that you need fuel to power the robot to collect this stuff. And given the fact that commercial ventures are starting to break the price point barrier - check out spaceX - 10k a kg will drop an order of magnitude in the next 10 years, easy.
I understand the argument from the standpont that it cost money to put the salvage into orbit. However "collecting" may wind up costing you more than the fragment itself weighs. Consider: Even if you make it up to LEO for free, you have to get to the item and match your position and velocity in the direction the space salvage is traveling to a degree where you (or your robot, whatever) can grab it. Of course you have to abide by the ideal rocket equation http://exploration.grc.nasa.gov/education/rocket/
check out http://www.tethers.com/ They have a net thingie for grabbing space debris, and tethers for dragging debris out of orbit!
What a great series of games that was...
This plug-in shows the mess up there quite clearly, and it's only showing a fraction of whats really above our heads
Nawwww, not too obscure. Good show. It's actually just what I was going to post about, myself. For those who haven't seen it, Planetes is a Japanese cartoon about space debris collectors in the near-ish future. IT's actually quite interesting, and has a pretty good story arc. It gets into exploitation of 3rd world nations, like Mananga, and El Tanika, human drive to explore, the importance of getting a proper visa if you intend to work, etc. The Debris collection section is funded by "The Union" (UN like world government) through environmental tax credits for all the debris they cleanup. This is fairly unprofitable, so the debris section is considered to be very unimportant in the hierarchy. But, they save the day on several occasions, expose trechery, and so forth. And, most important of all, they help crazy moon ninjas save people from a burning hotel on the moon. Crazy Space Ninjas who don't have proper work visas!
It's not quite "hard sci fi" but it's closer to it than almost any other cartoon you'll ever watch. Some of the visuals seem like they were probably inspired by 2001.
Man, first my wife complains and now NASA?
I just need my space.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
I like space junk - it keeps the aliens away.
First off it makes us look like a poorer planet, I mean honestly who wants to conquer a home with a trans-am up on blocks in the front driveway and thousands of beer cans strewn about the lawn?? Sorry little green guys, we already stripmined this place!
But it's also practical -- long before the impending alien invasion can occur, they'll need to clean up the space junk before they can place their ships in near earth orbit. As soon as the space junk is gone, then there is really nothing to stop them from enslaving us and using us as a food source (mmm.. protein)
As far as i'm concerned space junk is one of the few things keeping us safe, that -- and of course the avian flu. (I'm harboring infected chickens in my cellar just in case one of those little green men shows up at my door)
"It's like any environmental problem," he said. "It's growing. If you don't tackle it now, it will only become worse, and the remedies in the future are going to be even more costly than if you tackle it today."
So like all the other environmental problems, a tiny percentage of the population will change it for the better, but the overwhelming majority will still contribute to the problem until it's so bad that, well, most environmental problems are still getting worse, so the outcome of that scenario has yet to be determined. Not good, though, I'd bet.
stuff |
Skimming though the replies, I'm surprised I haven't seen any mention of the Kessler syndrome. In a nutshell, space junk creates more space junk through collisions in a chain reaction that eventually renders LEO unusable for many years.
Perhaps NASA and othe space agencies need to launch satellites that will unfold into giant aerogel panels, similar to the collector on the Stardust spacecraft, but on a much larger scale. These giant fly swatters would sweep through space for a few years, picking up paint flecks and other micro-debris before being deorbited.
Of course, these spacecraft would have to steer clear of objects large enough to punch through their panels to avoid contributing to the Kessler syndrome, rather than avoiding it.
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It is EXCELLENTLY written, and is great fun to watch even if you're not that interested in space trash. Great story, also deals a bit with global economics and what happens when you widen the development/financial gap between 1st and 3rd world countries even more by bringing the massive profits from space mining and tourism into play.
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Start grabbing them out of orbit and sell them on ebay to goldenpalace for $25,000 each. That way they can clean space and make a profit!
Also, there are a lot of objects up there (spent rocket stages, dead satellites) that stand a good chance of exploding as they age (from leaking hypergolic propellants, etc.), which tends to generate lots and lots of chunks that are too small to track but big enough to cause said VBD.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled."--Feynman
"If it costs $10k per kg to get something to LEO, all you have to do is find stuff already in LEO that could work, grab it, and put it to use. I'm sure some of the stuff up there has some practical application."
Sweet idea, but if anyone really wants to help humanity today , they should probably go to the dumps and scrapyards of any third-world-country currently being used as a hardware-"/dev/null" by us and try to work out how to make somehing worthwile out of that junk (without contaminating future generations of the locals).
Jus' sayin'... not really snarky.
sig? Oh, that sig...
This is the perfect scenario for an old game "Asteroids" to be updated... Blow up the crap, get points, blow up a functional satellite, lose big points. Blow up the ISS, get fried by Ronald Reagan's Rayguns.
I think it's got potential...
Sign me as a Gamer, who gamed long ago when all your home system played was pong or double pong(hockey) who fed many a quarters into Asteroids, Asteroids Deluxe, Space Invaders deluxe too, and an all time favorite BattleZone....
I'd be happy to go out and zap the crap!
Sig Hansen?