Space debris: We need a space garbage collector

[ar81]

If you played orbiter, you may think space is mostly empty, but it is far from that.
Do you want to see all objects around Earth with Google Earth?

1.Download this file: http://adn.agi.com/SatelliteDatabase/SatelliteDatabase.kmz
2.Double click on the file and it will install a Google Earth addon.

It displays:
1.Active satelites
2.Inactive satellites
3.Debris
4.Rocket bodies.

You will notice that active satellites are a minority.
We already have seen and impact of satellites in 2009.

U.S. Satellite Destroyed in Space Collision
http://www.space.com/news/090211-satellite-collision.html

This animation predicts the trajecory of the debris.

Animation shows spread of debris from satellite collision
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyG3zqLyW8k

We need a garbage collector in real life, and we ned a garbage collector in Orbiter too.
Why do we need it?  Because a Kessler syndrome could disrupt telecommunications, weather, GPS systems, etc.
Basically our world would stop working as it does nowadays.

[tofitouf]

it's incredible how much they are.

[Bibi Uncle]

Wow ! Awesome ! I never think that Saturn V Rocket generated space debris. I tought that only the first and second stages would stay alive (the first stage has been destroy since Apollo 14 or 15 I think...). The two others should not be desintegrate after reaching their periapsis ? The SM is death because it follows the trajectory of the CM. The first part of the LM is always on the moon, but what about the second part (the one with the docking system) ?

Space programs should pay attention to other satellites. We don't want to destroy Sputnik ! (Spoutnik or Sputnik ? I think that Spoutnik is in French and Sputnik in English. If not, please let me know .)



Message modifié ( 15-03-2010 23:48 )

[Tefal]

Bibi Uncle a écrit:
Wow ! Awesome ! I never think that Saturn V Rocket generated space debris.

Well, yes it does. Anything left "dead" in orbit without control/tracking is debris, and this ranges from discarded small pieces (covers, bolts, whatnot) and tools lost by various astro/cosmonauts, all the way up to used rocket stages and satellites that failed. Orbits decay with time and a lot of the objects end up burning up in the atmosphere, cleaning up the mess a bit - but at the altitudes used by most communication satellites, the decay, if there is any, is too slow. Junk builds up and stays there for a long time, which is a reason why there exists a "graveyard orbit" where old sats get sent to die. If they die before, accidentally, are from a country/organisation that just doesn't care or from a time before these orbits were used, they're bothersome, uncontrollable junk on a very busy orbit full of active satellites.

I tought that only the first and second stages would stay alive (the first stage has been destroy since Apollo 14 or 15 I think...). The two others should not be desintegrate after reaching their periapsis ? The SM is death because it follows the trajectory of the CM. The first part of the LM is always on the moon, but what about the second part (the one with the docking system) ?

You actually mean the third stage of a Saturn-V would stay alive, the one used to do the lunar transfer burn. Yes it would. Most of them, without an orbital insertion burn like the CM-LM, would shoot past the moon. If I remember correctly, they'd leave the Earth's influence and orbit the sun. Some of them are still there, but so far that they're not so much of a problem. They're not lying dead on an orbit already full of stuff. After about Apollo 14 or 15, like you said, the NASA started aiming at the moon with the third stages - not really to avoid space junk, but rather to do something like the recent asteroid and moon impact missions did: make the moon's surface blow up and see what's in the dust cloud.

The SM probably ended up grilling like you describe it. As for the ascent stage of the LM, it remained in low Moon orbit, so low that the irregularities in the Moon's mass would always make its orbit decay until it would crash.

Space programs should pay attention to other satellites. We don't want to destroy Sputnik ! (Spoutnik or Sputnik ? I think that Spoutnik is in French and Sputnik in English. If not, please let me know .)

I have bad news for you... Sputnik 1 decayed and burned up a few years after launch, its orbit was too low to stay durable.

Tefal

[Bibi Uncle]

I have bad news for you... Sputnik 1 decayed and burned up a few years after launch, its orbit was too low to stay durable.

I didn't know that too. I am currently reading 3001 : The Final Odyssey (in French of course) of Arthur C. Clarke. Of course, I have read the three previous one and one of them (2010 I think) said that Sputnik was still alive after about 50 years. I had search on Wikipedia (one of the best site ever) and I find that there was 10 Sputnik launch by the U.S.S.R. Some of them had carry animals (some animals died Maybe it helps the U.S. to reach the Moon ? Well, I hope.).