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Satellites Collide In Orbit

Posted by samzenpus on from the starpocalypse dept.

DrEnter writes "According to this story on Yahoo, two communications satellites collided in orbit, resulting in two large clouds of debris. The new threat from these debris clouds hasn't been fully determined yet. From the article, 'The collision involved an Iridium commercial satellite, which was launched in 1997, and a Russian satellite launched in 1993 and believed to be nonfunctioning. Each satellite weighed well over 1,000 pounds.' This is the fifth spacecraft/satellite collision to occur in space, but the other four were all fairly minor by comparison."

4 of 456 comments (clear)

  1. When Satellites Collide! by AJ+Mexico · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Too bad orbital tracking didn't give enough warning for Iridium to get their bird out of the way. I guess no one is cross checking the orbits of all satellites? I know it is done for the shuttle and space station. (The space station *has* maneuvered to keep away from space junk.)

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  2. Planetes by Bonker · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Planetes is a japenese cartoon about this very subject, and other unpleasant realities of space travel including space-radiation induced cancer, the birth problems of people living on the moon, and the long delay involved in inter-planetary travel.

    The main character, 'Hachimaki', is basically a space garbage collector.

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  3. Re:Was this really bound to happen? by Zak3056 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Iridium Satellite should file a claim against the Russians.

    Typically, when it comes to right of way, the less maneuverable vehicle has the right of way (for example, a balloon has the right of way over a glider, which has the right of way over an airship, which has the right of way over an airplane. Similar rules apply to seaborne vessels.) Taking at face value the summary's statement that the Russian satellite was non-functional, it was clearly the duty of the operators of the Iridium satellite to take action. If you want to talk claims/liability, I'd say that the Iridium folks are on the hook for huge damages--through negligence they've created a massive hazard to navigation that will be a problem for... what, centuries?

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  4. Re:5th collision?? by MichaelSmith · · Score: 5, Interesting

    How about the progress freighter which hit Mir because it had the incorrect mass information loaded?

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