Orbital Debris

[Deepwater6]

http://www.space.com/19445-space-junk-threat-orbital-debris-cleanup.html

 

I don't see governments going out of their way spending money on this during these economic times. I do think private space travel companies will try and do something when it starts to worry their customers.

 

I don't think the fish net idea will work. Maybe for some of the bigger objects, but there is just too much up there. The smaller items will continue to collide. Large countries will continue to pollute and new contries trying to acheive space will continue to grow over time adding more. :(

[Buffy]

The key to the fishnet working is really going to be how it handles large relative velocity. Given the range of such velocities, there are going to be lots of cases where no matter how strong the net is, it'll get blasted through.

 

Just so long as it does not cause the object to break up further, causing a bigger problem, that debris will be slowed down, causing it to fall into at least a lower orbit, if not causing it to deorbit completely much faster than it would have.

 

And that would be a good thing!

 

While I do think that it will be economic necessity that will create the funds required to fix the problem, it must not be forgotten that the economic liability likely to ensue from someone accidentally blasting a large manageable piece into a zillion tiny and hard to catch projectiles is a risk that may hold things up. The Chinese already badly tarnished their reputation by blowing up some satellites as a test of an anti-satellite weapon, and it's only because it was carried out by the Chinese Army that someone did not get sued for a bazillion dollars.

 

 

People will do things in a boardroom that they would never do as an individual. Group decisions, no personal liability, :phones:

Buffy

[LaurieAG]

Probably better late than never Buffy.

 

It's a bit of an academic question really as the NEO that will pass by under the geostationary orbit in 3 weeks will probably destabilise a lot of junk and bring it down anyway. They could go anywhere and so could it.

[Deepwater6]

http://www.space.com/19446-darpa-phoenix-satellite-recycling-video.html

 

Hi Buffy/Laurie - I found this article/video about a DARPA program 'Pheonix". The fourth paragraph from the bottom speaks directly to our subject. The video is pretty cool too. I would suspect nanotech would be a big part of this endeavor in the future huh?

[LaurieAG]

The six tornadoes from 1:00pm to 4:00am in Bundaberg, in Harvey Bay QLD, came from the remnants of cyclone Oswald.

 

It just makes me wonder if somebody shot down the North Korean Satellite launched around 2 weeks ago?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA-193

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/feb/21/spaceexploration.usa