Space debris has reached 'tipping point'
Latest in Science
Related articles
On Facebook
From the blogs
Disclosure: We’d never even been to a club when we made our first single
For most of us, reaching eighteen years of age opens up a new world for exploration, spontaneity and...
Sepp Blatter: Penalty shoot-outs must remain, they’re football’s great leveller
As England supporters, we should scorn at any such deciding factor within football. On so many occas...
Why do some men consider the street as a female meat market?
Pronouncements on sexual inequality in the UK are normally met with an eye roll by my generation. As...
Political corruption reflects the widening chasm between the political class and the electorate
The corruption and hypocrisy which has come to characterise politics and politicians, and in particu...
Space junk has made such a mess of Earth's orbit that experts say we may need to finally think about cleaning it up.
That may mean vacuuming up debris with weird space technology - cosmic versions of nets, magnets and giant umbrellas, according to the chairman of an expert panel that issued a new report on the problem.
There are 22,000 objects in orbit that are big enough for officials on the ground to track and countless more smaller ones that could do damage to human-carrying spaceships and valuable satellites. The International Space Station has to move out of the way of debris from time to time.
"We've lost control of the environment," said retired Nasa senior scientist Donald Kessler, who headed the National Academy of Sciences report.
Since the space age began 54 years ago, civilisation has littered the area just above Earth's atmosphere with leftover boosters and other parts that come off during launches, as well as old satellites. When scientists noticed that this could be a problem, they came up with agreements to limit new space junk and those plans had been working.
Those agreements are intended to make sure what is sent into orbit eventually falls back to Earth and burns up.
But two events in the past four years - a 2007 Chinese anti-satellite weapon test and a 2009 crash-in-orbit of two satellites - put so much new junk in space that everything changed, the report said. The widely criticised Chinese test used a missile to smash an aging weather satellite into 150,000 pieces of debris larger 1cm and 3,118 pieces can be tracked by radar on the ground, the report said.
"Those two single events doubled the amount of fragments in Earth orbit and completely wiped out what we had done in the last 25 years," Mr Kessler said.
All that junk that means something has to be done, "which means you have to look at cleaning space", he said.
The study only briefly mentions the clean-up possibility, raising technical, legal and diplomatic hurdles. But it refers to a report earlier this year by a US Defence Department science think-tank that outlines all sorts of unusual techniques. The report by the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency is called "Catcher's Mitt" and it mentions harpoons, nets, tethers, magnets and even a giant dish or umbrella-shaped device that would sweep up tiny pieces of debris.
While the new report does not recommend using the technology, Mr Kessler said it is needed. He likes one company's idea of a satellite that is armed with nets that could be sprung on wayward junk. Attached to the net is an electromagnetic tether that could either pull the junk down to a point where it would burn up harmlessly or boost it to safer orbit.
Nasa officials said they are examining the study.
The report is from the National Research Council, a branch of the National Academy of Sciences, which is an independent organization chartered by Congress to advise the US government on science.
PA
- 1 Mark Zuckerberg saved $111m by selling Facebook shares before stock slumped
- 2 Brazil rocked by abortion for 9-year-old rape victim
- 3 Schoolboy spiked brownies with cannabis in cookery class
- 4 News in pictures
- 5 Lawyers told Hunt to stay out of Sky deal
- 6 Spain races to bail out bank as debt fears stalk Europe
- 7 Catcalls, whistles, groping: the everyday picture of sexual harassment in London
- 8 Actress Keira Knightley to marry rocker
- 9 Hollande visits the French troops he's taking home
- 10 Cameron aide’s cosy chats with News Corp
- 1 Mark Zuckerberg saved $111m by selling Facebook shares before stock slumped
- 2 Brazil rocked by abortion for 9-year-old rape victim
- 3 Schoolboy spiked brownies with cannabis in cookery class
- 4 Police letter reveals St Paul’s cathedral involvement in Occupy eviction
- 5 Fat? Really? Olympic hope laughs off official’s jibe – but others aren’t amused
- 6 'Hello mum, this is going to be hard for you to read ...'
- 7 African monkey meat that could be behind the next HIV
- 8 Cameron aide’s cosy chats with News Corp
- 9 Coke reveals its secret: It may need to carry a cancer warning
- 10 French in uproar over oral sex anti-smoking posters
Experience the Heineken Hub
Get free wi-fi and exclusive i content while you enjoy a tasty pint of Heineken at participating pubs.
Can you imagine a career in teaching?
Be inspired to teach - let real teachers show you how rewarding the job can be.
Playing a game-changing role during the Games
Cisco is providing the solutions for London 2012's complex IT needs.
Enter the latest Independent competitions
Win anything from gadgets to five-star holidays on our competitions and offers page.
Business videos from commercial thought leaders
Watch the best in the business world give their insights into the world of business.
Career Services
Day In a Page
Ridley Scott: The most macho man in movies?
Gallic gourmets put France back on culinary map
The outsider: Margaret Howell
For men only: A pilgrimage to Mount Athos
Feeding a hungry world – or meddling with laws of nature?



Comments