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Satellites Collide In Orbit
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."
Not to troll or to dwell into politics here, But does anyone here know any numbers for the *actual* chances/probabilities that satellite A will collide with satellite B in orbit around the Earth?
This "collision" seems to be much, MUCH, less probable than an 'innocent' ship's anchor dragging along the sea floor intercepting an undersea data cable (that just happens to plug much of the Middle East into the Internet)...
Does anyone know what these particular satellites were each being tasked to do? (prior to one of them becoming a single-use kinetic energy space-based weapon system projectile)
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?
Okay so if a Russian satellite falls from the sky on to my car, I am at fault because I could have moved out of the way?
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