| Title | Scientists Say That the Space Debris Problem is Getting Worse | |
| Date | Thursday April 20 2017, @04:32AM | |
| Author | Fnord666 | |
| Topic | ||
| from the what-a-piece-of-junk! dept. | ||
Scientists sounded the alarm Tuesday over the problems posed to space missions from orbital junk—the accumulating debris from mankind's six-decade exploration of the cosmos.
In less than a quarter of a century, the number of orbiting fragments large enough to destroy a spacecraft has more than doubled, a conference in Germany heard.
And the estimated tally of tiny objects—which can harm or degrade spacecraft in the event of a collision, and are hard to track—is now around 150 million.
"We are very much concerned," said Rolf Densing, director of operations at the European Space Agency (ESA), pleading for a worldwide effort to tackle the mess.
"This problem can only be solved globally."
Travelling at up to 28,000 kilometres (17,500 miles) per hour, even a minute object impacts with enough energy to damage the surface of a satellite or manned spacecraft.
If you always wondered why the Death Star had a trash compactor, here's your answer.
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printed from SoylentNews, Scientists Say That the Space Debris Problem is Getting Worse on 2024-04-23 23:30:46