Beware of Falling Space Junk and Space Debris
Posted on February 15, 2008
Filed Under Technology
Just watching a report on CNN, and they showed a map of all the debris and trash that is orbiting the earth. I had no idea…
Here is a map showing just how much there is.
1) Russians Space Debris
2) Geosynchronous satellites
3) Junk from Scientific Missions
4) Junk from Other Countries - including the European Space Agency, Japan, France, India, and several companies.
5) Space Junk/ Debris that Will Fall Soon - old junk falls back through the atmosphere about once a day.
More maps of Space Junk/ Debris
As you can see from these maps, Earth’s orbit is extremely crowded with clutter from many scientific missions (like the Hubble Space Telescope), manned spaceflights, and also the International Space Station.
This space trash, junk, and debris ranges from things as small as a spatula dropped by space-shuttle astronauts to bigger bags of trash dropped by the international space station.
Is this debris dangerous?
In one case, a collision with a tiny space trash particle (only about one tenth of a millimeter wide) resulted in a 1 millimeter wide crack in a space shuttle window.
What you may have called a “falling star” is probably space junk, which falls back through the atmosphere about once a day. Usually the debris completely burns up on reentry, but several 100-pound-plus fragments have crashed to Earth. Surprisingly, there has only been one report of an injury, a woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma, who was hit by falling space junk.
This brings us to the current news of a bus-sized satellite now hurtling toward earth, which is carrying about 1,000 pounds of toxic fuel. The plan is to shoot it down with a star-wars like missile.
There will be one chance / attempt at getting this right, which is going to be about as difficult as hitting a bullet with another bullet. If successful, it will just create millions of little pieces of space junk, which will probably burn up on re-entry, but if it fails, we can only hope that someone will be able to predict exactly where it will land.
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12 Responses to “Beware of Falling Space Junk and Space Debris”
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if theres just one piece falling every day the chances of it hitting you out of the entire human race are one to a bit over 6 billion. THe chances of it hitting any person on the entire surface of the earth are so small its almost meaningless. its just so unlikely. i hate it that posts whip up concern about being hit by space-spatulas and insinuate that because an object is ever so slightly bigger it will have more of an impact when it would actually take an enormous increase in size for it to have a widespread effect.
@Charlie
The first 4/5 of the post is to set a backstory so as the enhance the understanding of the impending threat that the bus-sized piece of debris poses. A half ton of toxic fuel is a very large risk. Let’s assume the 3/4 of it burns up on reentry, there would still be 250 pounds of toxic fuel hurtling towards earth. Whether it hits land, populated or otherwise, or sea, it will create a danger that needs to be dealt with.
The purpose of this post is to first set a backdrop behind the necessity of launching a preemptive strike against this debris by highlighting the danger that space debris causes.
yhbt.yhl.hand.
@ Charlie
NOOB, you fail. Go back to school
“What you may have called a “falling star” is probably space junk, which falls back through the atmosphere about once a day”.
A rather misleading statement.
Approximately 100 to 1000 metric tonnes of meteorites fall to the earth every day, space junk makes up a minute fragment of this.
Space junk may be a hazard to new space missions, but the kind of debris that poses such a threat does not threaten us. Anything big enough to survive reentry is very easy to spot and plan for when it comes to space missions.
250 pounds of hydrazine does NOT constitute a real hazard. The odd are immensely high that it will simply burn up on contact with the heat of re-entry.
Read on: it is ROCKET FUEL.
Hydrazine oxidises ridiculously easily. In fact, that is one of the reasons it is so dangerous… at ground level, when you are messing about with it…
…NOT 20 miles up, at 2000K or more.
The hydrazine will burn up. NASA is just freaking in case someone gets a hold of enough of it to sell as it’s a classified spy satellite!
Why the flame ROFLcopter? Are you 12? The term noob generally is spelled ‘N00B’ (those are zeros) and it is generally used in connection with video games… something you should go back to and leave the intelligent comments to your betters. Its all about spy technology. The US is afraid someone will end up with enough of the satellite to be able to sell it on a site like eBay and have it end up in Chinese or Russian hands. In simpler words: politics as usual.
Hydrazine, the fuel in question, boils at 115 degrees Centigrade (slightly higher than water), and burns in air, releasing ammonia, nitrogen,
and steam. There is no possible way for it to
survive a meteoric re-entry. All the hydrazine
in multiple tanks in the Columbia and Challenger
shuttles burned in midair releasing no toxins.
The hydrazine aboard USA 193 does not pose any
hazard to human or other life. (If there is a
radioisotope power pack on board, that’s a whole
other story - and a reason to shoot the thing
down over water.)
Why shoot (at) the satellite? To demonstrate the
“effectiveness” of U.S. antisatellite weapons. Of
course, this shot would not have been publicized,
if the autodestruct system on the satellite was
not in good working order - if the ASM misses,
they just pop the onboard explosives and announce
a successful intercept. Since this has to be timed
with the arrival of the ASM on target (to fool
foreign radar operators), even NORAD may never
know if the intercept was a hit or near miss.
“This brings us to the current news of a bus-sized satellite now hurtling toward earth, which is carrying about 1,000 pounds of toxic fuel. The plan is to shoot it down with a star-wars like missile.”
If the toxic fuel is in the satellite, then it will not oxidize and if the satellite has heat shield, then even it won’t dissolve. Most of the fuel will remain intact if the satellite is heat protected
It is all politics. it’s the American response to China shooting down its own weather satellite. The Chinese have proved that they have the technology to shoot down orbiting satellites, be that Chinese or other. so to respond, the Americans need to show that they have the same power over the skies. it is hard enough keeping things from burning up on reentry in purpose designed craft, the chances of the fuel making it back to the surface in its tin can of a container in comparison to designed heat protected containers is minimal at best. is this the reintroduction of the star wars project?
1000 pounds of frozen hydrazine WILL make it to the ground. It is frozen because the satellite died, heaters quit and they design these things to run cool so they can control temps. Challenger was shattered by the explosion and the fuel was liquid so it didn’t make it to the ground. Columbia was also liquid, warm, ready to evaporate/disperse besides also being mostly gone from the mission. Any NRO classified equipment would be designed to burn up on reentry since that is what happens to these vehicles at end of life anyway, usually in a planned, controlled reentry. Sure, they like testing capability, but the US isn’t always about world domination, I think they really spent the money (which is short because of Iraq) to ensure that tank doesn’t land in a European soccer field. This isn’t like the rape of the Constitution Bush is in the middle of. Just my opinion.
Photoshopped.
Actually, the chance of, say, a piece of space junk the size of a soccer ball hitting a particular spot on the earth’s surface is the cross sectional area of the soccer ball (about 615 square inches) divided by the surface area of the entire planet in square inches, or about 1 in 37,408,997,185,400. So, not bad. You’d do better buying a lottery ticket.