Thanks c0lo! Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
The pressure is rising at ESA’s mission control. A European Space Agency (ESA) satellite dodges out of the way of a mystery piece of space junk that was spotted just hours before a potential collision.
This means a vital step in the spacecraft’s ongoing journey to safer skies now has to be quickly rescheduled, as violent solar activity related to the ramping up of the solar cycle warps Earth’s atmosphere and threatens to drag the satellite down out of orbit…
[...] Swarm is actually ESA’s mission to unravel the mysteries of Earth’s magnetic field. It’s comprised of three satellites, A, B, and C – affectionately known as Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie.
A small piece of human-made junk circling our planet – known as space debris – was detected hurtling towards Alpha at 16:00 CEST (10:00 a.m. EDT), on June 30. From the trajectory, a potential collision was predicted just eight hours later, shortly after midnight. The chance of impact was great enough that Alpha needed to get out of the way – fast.
Swarm constellation. Swarm is ESA’s first Earth observation constellation of satellites. Its mission is to unravel one of the most mysterious aspects of our planet: the magnetic field.
[...] Each one of ESA’s satellites has to perform on average two evasive maneuvers every year – and that’s not including all the alerts they get that don’t end up needing evasive action.
[...] Carrying out evasive action – known as a ‘collision avoidance maneuver’ – requires a lot of planning. You have to check that you’re not moving the satellite into a new orbit that puts it at risk of other collisions and you have to calculate how to get back to your original orbit using as little fuel and losing as little science data as possible.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday July 19 2022, @05:07PM
Then, with clean skies, at least for orbits up to about 1000km, which should cover most of the junk from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_satellite_collision and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_missile_test , we can start again. And do it more responsibly this time. Maybe leave it 30000 years, just to be sure?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday July 19 2022, @05:12PM
In the US, there are many cultural differences between the north and south. Ending slavery ended a major difference, but there are others. The south is fence happy, the north not so much. In the south, there is more litter along the roadsides. There is a bit more of a wealth gap-- the poor in the south are a bit more impoverished than the poor in the north.
I should like to think that scientists are better people who have the sense not to litter low earth orbit as if it was a southern US roadside near where a bunch of slobs live. On the ground, it's no big deal to send out a crew to pick up the litter. It does cost, and it would be better if that expense could be avoided, but it's not a calamity. How do you clean up in space? Wait centuries for nature to decay the orbits to the point the trash re-enters? How about, don't litter in the first place?
(Score: 2) by Barenflimski on Tuesday July 19 2022, @05:22PM
You should see how many times I have to engage my collision avoidance skills while driving. These people crazy.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by quietus on Tuesday July 19 2022, @06:10PM (2 children)
(From the introductory text to the 7th European Conference on Space Debris).
Linky with lots of interesting reading & viewing material here [esa.int]. Note that there's close cooperation with 18th Space Control Squadron, US Air Force [spaceforce.mil] (monitoring) and NASA [nasa.gov].
Also, previous sub [soylentnews.org] about the subject.
(Score: 2) by quietus on Tuesday July 19 2022, @06:27PM
Also, forgot: but the article seems to be released to emphasize the inauguration of a new ESA facility, the Space Safety Centre in Darmstadt, Germany. This new facility will work in close cooperation with the Space Weather Services Network [esa.int].
This Space Weather Services Network works in close collaboration with US Mil's Space Surveillance Network. Here's an interesting older pdf [globalsecurity.org] (2003) describing some of its components and the wikipedia page [wikipedia.org] about it.
(Score: 2) by quietus on Tuesday July 19 2022, @06:57PM
The whole thing is part of ESA's Space19+ program, with Space Safety apparently a basic pillar. Space19+ has a budget of €14.4bn, seemingly limited to the period 2020-24.
One of the subprojects is Hera. In September of this year, NASA's DART [nasa.gov] will slam into the Didymoon asteroid at about 6.6 km/sec.
(source [esa.int])