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Astronauts Forced To Take Shelter From Space Junk

Posted by samzenpus on from the duck-and-cover dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Three astronauts living at the International Space Station were forced to scramble to safety Thursday after a "close pass" by flying Russian space debris. The men decamped into the Soyuz spacecraft, which is attached to the orbiting station, while a chunk of an old Russian weather satellite passed 1.5 miles away. Flight engineer Scott Kelly tweeted: "Happy there was no impact. Great coordination with international ground teams. Excellent training."

55 comments

  1. And still the Republicans fight... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    all efforts to clean-up space junk. It's as if they want even more astronauts to die. Too many already have from their severe budgets cuts.

    1. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by garyisabusyguy · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Not so much fight, just ignore, until... ...there is some tragedy and they get a chance to declare a "War on Space Junk", then they will go into full gear, setting up shell corporations to suck up government funding while accomplishing very little beyond what would normally deorbit due to atmospheric drag. We might even get lucky and create an even more dangerous situation by placing tons of gear into orbit attempting to 'clean up'

      Of course they will declare victory early on and then blame a subsequent administration for abandoning their efforts, defaming everybody who fell in the battle against space junk and cow-towing to the effects of inertia and gravity

      So, business as usual

      --
      Wherever You Go, There You Are
    2. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      And the democrats will claim that all people have the right to space junk, not just the rich who can see it in space, and steal some of your hard earned salary to send probes up there to capture space junk and redistribute it to the poor. Or they will pass a huge long law that they "have to pass to read it" and that forces everyone to buy space junk, even if they don't need it because they live a healthy lifestyle, and lies to people about being able to keep their old junk but in reality they must replace it with inferior but more expensive space junk.

    3. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      ... being able to keep their old junk but in reality they must replace it with inferior but more expensive space junk.

      You're still pissed off about that low-flow toilet, aren't you, Hank?

    4. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by garyisabusyguy · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      *golf claps*

      When you crap out a doozy like that, it is no wonder you don't have to intestinal fortitude to use you own UID

      You must be so proud

      --
      Wherever You Go, There You Are
    5. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by davester666 · · Score: 0

      The free market will solve this problem.

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    6. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by aybiss · · Score: 5, Funny

      This is me logging in to tell you there is no such thing as cow-towing, but the idea of it happening in orbit cracks me up.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      --
      It's OK Bender, there's no such thing as 2.
    7. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And the democrats will claim that all people have the right to space junk

      And, if you like your space junk, you can keep your space junk.

    8. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by garyisabusyguy · · Score: 3, Funny

      It does lend itself to the idea of western ranchers aiding in the "War on Space Junk"(TM) by providing range-fed beef to be launched into orbit, where they will act like sponges mopping up vast swaths of orbital trash, then burn up like fireworks as they fall back to Earth, with the various metallic particles each providing a different color of light.

      I can even see an aged Marlborough Man-esque figure getting all sentimental over his herd giving their all to save the space-men then turning it into a piece of insightful Cowboy poetry

      --
      Wherever You Go, There You Are
    9. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by AK+Marc · · Score: 2

      Kessler syndrome indicates that if they wait for a couple large impacts, it could be too late.

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    10. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Kessler syndrome indicates that if they wait for a couple large impacts, it could be too late.

      I propose that we launch a ion drive satellite that can change orbits at will and use magnets and electrostatic and physical means to capture space junk and dead satellites and either deliver them to a garbage depot in orbit for recycling or place them in a de-orbit trajectory that will use the gravitational influence of still active and maneuverable satellites to de-orbit further.

      (It is known that when an object in a lower orbit and an object an a higher orbit pass by each other the gravitational influence of the lower, faster moving object loses energy to the slower moving, higher orbit object, thereby causing the lower object to slow down and move into a lower orbit and speed up the higher orbit object pushing it into a higher orbit.)

      We could measure the efficiency of this garbage collecting satellite by the amount of distance it travels to clear away X amount of tonnage of space debris. I'll put it another way...

      We can sell the idea like this: Call the Satellite the Millennium Falcon, and when people look at you funny because of the sci-fi reference, Say "You've never heard of the Millennium Falcon? it's the ship that made the Kessler Run in less than 12 parsecs!" Star Wars defense system 2.0! (totally republican concept first uttered by Ronald Reagan.)

      Seriously though, we need an international law that states that end of life of any object put into orbit must include a plan for it's debris collection and de-orbit into a target zone in the pacific ocean. (it's a big target)

      Definition of Irony? Captcha = Naughty

    11. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

      Seriously though, we need an international law that states that end of life of any object put into orbit must include a plan for it's debris collection and de-orbit into a target zone in the pacific ocean. (it's a big target)

      Won't work for GEO. They don't carry enough fuel to de-orbit, and doing so would be cost prohibitive.

      If we ever sent up a space elevator, how would we protect it from all our junk? Would we need to clean up the orbits, or could we armor it, or have a point defense system?

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    12. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      If you build a real space elevator, it will clear its own orbit of junk. If it can't do that, it is called a dwarf space elevator.

    13. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      I can even see an aged Marlborough Man-esque figure getting all sentimental over his herd giving their all to save the space-men then turning it into a piece of insightful Cowboy poetry

      By which you mean he'll deliver his speech while dying of cancer in a dark room, right?

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    14. Re:And still the Republicans fight... by Shortguy881 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Having been to the facilities that track space junk, I can say you have no idea what you are talking about. They contain some of the worlds most advanced equipment.

      And not that I really care much about partisan politics, but the facilities are military with year over year increasing budgets. Military spending is typically associated with the republican party.

      --
      Brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants.
    15. Re: And still the Republicans fight... by aybiss · · Score: 1

      No way; heat, metal and meat. I fail to see what is bad about this situation.

      --
      It's OK Bender, there's no such thing as 2.
  2. Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Really cool movie.

    1. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by ClickOnThis · · Score: 1

      Really cool movie.

      Yes, but with lots of inaccuracies.

      --
      If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
    2. Re: Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And full of bad science and inaccuracies.

      Perhaps if you went to IMDb you'd get people to agree with you, but on Slashdot you'll only get the autistic responses about how they wouldn't have even seen the space junk flying around the earth at that speed and so on.

    3. Re: Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bad example. The speed of the space junk relative to the earth doesn't matter. The speed of the junk relative to them is what matters, and it can be arbitrarily close to 0 depending on how parallel the orbits are.

    4. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Surely you mean Planetes.

    5. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Really cool movie.

      Yes, but with lots of inaccuracies.

      Yeah, saw it, and read the article. Now... parts of the movie are NOT as inaccurate as you might think...

      Time (and Neil deGrasse Tyson, who also took issue with the film's accuracy or lack-thereof,) both got this basic point wrong: They both basically stated that there's no way that would/could happen because they're in different orbits. (Tyson also pointed out that nothing orbits in that direction anyway, which is also right, but simultaneously wrong.)

      They both failed to consider the possibility of something going horribly, catastrophically wrong. Sure, in the course of the film they neglected this possibility but... suppose a Russian satellite launch aimed and intended for a higher and faster orbit, (fast in terms of tangential velocity, NOT orbital period,) but that something went wrong with the vehicle during the initial boost phase. Suppose first that the controllers have no means to control or abort/detonate the launch. Compound that with the craft heeling over the wrong way, (something wrong with guidance,) and accelerating into orbit in the wrong direction.

      This could easily happen. Now of course, it would not be able to get as high, since instead of benefiting from the starting rotational velocity of the Earth's rotation, it instead has to COUNTER that to get into space. Not that hard, actually, it simply means that when the craft shut down the engine, it would be traveling about 2000 miles per hour or so more slowly than it would have, tangentially with respect to the Earth, (about 1000 mph each for missing the rotational assist, and for having to OVERCOME the same by flying in the opposite direction,) roughly. That simply means a somewhat lower orbit, and it WOULD be in the wrong direction. Now suppose the system later realizes there's a mistake OR it plows into something? End result? A counter-orbiting debris cloud, (depending on how and when it was initially destroyed) of deadly satellite shrapnel that also, oh, P.S., by the way, would slowly de-orbit spontaneously if it were low enough, periodically to encounter the occasional stray wisp of atmosphere, as occurs in very low Earth orbit.

      (If you're having trouble understanding this, consider this. A kid on a skateboard traveling 5 miles per hour north, throws a softball at 35 miles per hour with respect to him. The speed of the ball when it leaves his hand with respect to the ground is 40 miles per hour. If however, he turns around and is now facing south, and throws the ball with the same force, it ends up going only 30 miles per hour with respect to the ground. Slower, sure, but it will be going SOUTH this time. If it was supposed to be going NORTH, it is going the wrong way now. Since escape velocity of the Earth is VASTLY higher than the tangential velocity that can be used or must be overcome at the Earth's surface, depending on which way you're launching, this is an easily possible scenario. Everyone launches pretty much the same direction of course because for one thing, it's cheaper, and also it means everything else is going the same way you are, vastly reducing the odds of a collision.)

      Or so I've heard. What do I know, I'm not a fancy rocket scientist or astrophysicist. Just an eff'ing engineering student. The crux is, when you consider whether or not a situation is possible, you don't consider ONLY if YOU know how it COULD happen, but whether or not there is any reason why it COULDN'T. In this case, there's no reason why it couldn't. There are plenty of reasons why it wouldn't, but NO reason why it couldn't, in point of fact.

      Sure, everything orbiting in a given orbit is going the same way, ONCE IT SUCCESSFULLY GETS TO ORBIT! That's kind of the point. The "Gravity" scenario starts off with a lot of things going WRONG.

      Beside that, of course, y

    6. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by dunkelfalke · · Score: 1

      +1 for Planetes.
      Probably the most accurate SF you'd ever see on TV.

      --
      "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
    7. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Well, why does she especially have to be gorgeous?"

      "TICKET SALES, DUH!"

      I took the movie and the fact that Sandra Bullock was a gorgeous astronaut as a very long, subtle 2 hour woman driver so bad joke. Consider this, after the initial disaster she managed to down a space shuttle, the ISS and the Chinese space station. She is probably the worst driver in history given that track record!

    8. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I once tried watching that but couldn't make past three first episodes. There was that annoying anime over-acting ADHD element buried so deep into the characters that it felt awful. I wish it wasn't so, the idea was nice.

    9. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by gbjbaanb · · Score: 1

      or to put it another way

      Scientist:" Lol Gravity is full of inaccuracies, I mean nothing could actually hit the ISS"

      News 3 days later: "IIS takes emergency action as killer lump of satellite comes perilously close to hitting it".

      Scientists, easy to tell us all how wrong we are without stopping to consider possibilities.

    10. Re:Did anyone else see Gravity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I tried, but I left the room dry heaving after the scene with the station breaking up started. It was disturbingly unrealistic, sure it looked neat, but if you believe even 1/10th of that could happen in real life you've been been watching too much Transformers and its fried your brain.

  3. sure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    now they try to cover up their lies by destroying their international fake station with fake junk. It's over now!

  4. That's Rusky Space Junk by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Redundant as that is.

  5. passed 1.5 miles away by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Was this made up by the submitter? It's nowhere to be found in the article.

    1. Re: passed 1.5 miles away by Buck+Feta · · Score: 1

      Who reads the articles?

      --
      I am Audience.
    2. Re:passed 1.5 miles away by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Miles?

  6. FYI... by garyisabusyguy · · Score: 0

    My first post was "Funny", my SECOND post was "Flame Bait"

    Just thought you would benefit from the demonstration

    --
    Wherever You Go, There You Are
  7. Scramble? by hosterdave · · Score: 1

    Really? They scrambled to safety... in space?

    1. Re:Scramble? by CurryCamel · · Score: 1

      Scramble:
      1. To move or climb hurriedly, especially on the hands and knees.
      2. To struggle or contend frantically in order to get something: scrambled for the best seats.

      What caught me was that they scrambled to safety to a Soyuz.

    2. Re:Scramble? by MattGWU · · Score: 1

      Yep, frantic bongo music...the rug bunched up behind them. It was a textbook scramble.

      --
      "These people look deep within my soul and assign me a number based on the order in which I joined" --Homer re:
  8. That was close by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I wonder how much time they would have to react if they had to adjust "if possible" the position or trajectory of the ISS.

    1.5 miles is really close if you think about it.

  9. Three Astronauts? by rsmith-mac · · Score: 2

    Why are there only three astronauts on the ISS right now rather than six? Are we between crew rotations right now?

    1. Re:Three Astronauts? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yes. 3 more launch on 22nd of July.

    2. Re:Three Astronauts? by rsmith-mac · · Score: 1

      Gotcha. Thanks.

    3. Re:Three Astronauts? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They've been running with minimal crews pretty regularly, with the reliability issues/retirement of the shuttle and reliance on Russian craft for crewed support being the primary reasoning. They had hoped have full crews of 6-7 after commercial crewed/cargo launch services were up and running but with ULA's, Russias & SpaceX's recent launch failures that ambition may be in jeopardy.

  10. Gravity by slickwillie · · Score: 1

    I JUST finished watching the movie Gravity about 5 minutes ago.

    1. Re:Gravity by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      Well, you can enjoy some levity now for a change.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
  11. Sandra bollocks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    floating bollocks

  12. Russian space debris by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Russian space debris, American space debris... it's all made in China

    1. Re:Russian space debris by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, the stuff that goes to space isn't mass produced. China rarely designs/creates anything - they take other people's designs and make it cheaper and in greater quantities.

  13. But don't worry! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Hard drives got better and we have 3D printers, nothing shall stop the entire SPECIES from colonizing the universe!!!

    Look out, a 6-32 bolt!!! Everyone hide!!!!!!!!!!!

  14. What happens if the Soyuz spacecraft gets hit? by SniffTheGlove · · Score: 1

    I am sure they must have radar on the ISS that can show and track incoming junk so they don't have to hide if somthing passes 1.5miles away. If they take refeuge in the Soyuz spacecraft what would happen if that was hit instead of the ISS

    1. Re:What happens if the Soyuz spacecraft gets hit? by MouseR · · Score: 1

      It's all ground based.

    2. Re:What happens if the Soyuz spacecraft gets hit? by hpacheco · · Score: 1

      A Soyuz spacecraft has a significantly surface area than the rest of the ISS so the chance of being hit is significantly smaller

    3. Re:What happens if the Soyuz spacecraft gets hit? by hpacheco · · Score: 1

      *significantly smaller area

    4. Re:What happens if the Soyuz spacecraft gets hit? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      I suspect there's also the issue of durability and mutual shading. And ISS being large enough that no single part (or at least very few of them) is critical for survival.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    5. Re:What happens if the Soyuz spacecraft gets hit? by Chrontius · · Score: 1

      They have space suits* on the Soyuz, so when the whole thing is opened to space by a large hole made by space rocks, they can close off the depressurized model and repressurize the rest of the station. *At least those orange survival suits used for mitigating loss-of-pressure accidents on takeoff and landing.

  15. Scramble might be an exaggeration by MouseR · · Score: 1

    It's a fairly routine activity for them to hunk down on passing debris. I remember a story a few years ago when they actually had to do this for a fleck of paint about 1cm in size.

    They're trained for these and it probably happens a lot more than we know.

  16. What was the space junk doing... by neminem · · Score: 1

    What was the Space Junk doing with the shelter in the first place? And what forced the astronauts to take it away?