NASA Monitors Hunk of Junk Headed for ISS

[joebob2000]

Considering that it would be 100% fatal for all on board if it came in contact with any of the shuttle or station (except maybe the very end of a solar cell) they take this sort of thing very seriously. The good thing about the station's relatively low orbit is that it is in a range where decay happens relatively quickly (on the order of a few years) so it only has to worry about new or rapidly changing debris.

 

[wild9]

Would all the UFO's please take extra care on Friday? Thank you very much.

Yours sincerely,

Mankind.

 

[tacoslave]

just hire goku!!! or is he working for the chinese!!?!?! pray to god he isnt...

 

[Shadow703793]

[citation][nom]jellico[/nom]I know you were making a joke, but the one thing you don't want to do is make MORE debris in orbital space. What would be really good is if we could figure out a way to mount some sort of weapon (such as a recoiless ice cannon), that could be used to shoot at passing junk to hopefully knock it into a decaying orbit. If you miss, the ice projectile will quickly sublime so it won't add to the problem.[/citation]

Umm...isn't the temp in space like -200C? So wouldn't the ice still be there? I don't see how it would sublimate quickly, it will eventually melt(?) due to heat/radiation from the Sun.

 

[IncinX]

Their thumbs are probably crippled from all those years of space invaders. How can they possibly expect to shoot it down?

 

[Ciuy]

nuke it

 

[eddieroolz]

I think we need the Boeing lasers to vaporize these junks!

 

[opmopadop]

nuke it

 

[DejaVuBoy]

Here we have a fantastic example of what could happen after a "space war", millions of left-over projectiles circling the earth at speeds 10-20 times faster than a bullet that represent instant death for any craft that tries to fly through - an effective end to safe space travel from Earth. Amazing are the bastards in the aerospace industry that have the gall to build cluster rockets and such in the name of "national defense".

 

[matt87_50]

[citation][nom]Mr_Man[/nom][citation][nom]jerther[/nom]Can't they just shoot it, Asteroids style?[/citation]
One word: debris.[/citation]

yeah? in Asteroids when you shoot it it breaks in to debris, then you just shoot the debris!

I think your underetemating Asteroids' merit as a space emergency management simulator.

 

[jellico]

[citation][nom]skalagon[/nom]How did they spot it? Or do they put trackers on the rocket casings so they know where they are or something?[/citation]

They track all debris in orbital space above a certain size so they can assess the potential risk to satelites, the shuttle, the space station, etc.

http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/usspc-fs/space.htm

 

[jellico]

[citation][nom]Shadow703793[/nom]Umm...isn't the temp in space like -200C? So wouldn't the ice still be there? I don't see how it would sublimate quickly, it will eventually melt(?) due to heat/radiation from the Sun.[/citation]
Don't forget, there are two components that determine when something will change state: temperature and pressure. As you increase altitude, the pressure decreases and so does the temperature required to make water boil. 100 degrees Celcius (212 F) is the boiling point of water at sea level.

In space, the pressure is nearly zero, so the boiling point is very low (actually, in space, water will go directly from a solid to a gas if the temperature is high enough). In orbital space, especially on the side of the earth facing the sun, the temperature is plenty high enough for small chunks of ice to quickly vaporize.

 

[mitch074]

Some time ago, I watched a Japanese "realistic" sci-fi cartoon called Planetes. It follows the daily life of a space debris removal section (since this activity doesn't generate any profit, the pay is bad, work condition are terrible, and the only ones that stay on the team are real misfits).

In short, there might be space-trained, EVA-qualified trashmen up there one of these days.

 

[radium69]

[citation][nom]fulle[/nom]I know how NASA feels. I barely dodged an encounter with my horrible ex girlfriend today, by about 2 miles. I might need to relocate.[/citation]

Made my day 😉!

 

[Dmerc]

How do the UFO's get through to Earth with all the space junk floating around?

 

[Andraxxus]

Very soon we will have the Rings of Earth made out of debris.

 

[jellico]

[citation][nom]Andraxxus[/nom]Very soon we will have the Rings of Earth made out of debris.[/citation]

It's a common misapprehension to think that when you hear about the floating garbage patch in the ocean, or orbiting debris, that your mind conjures up images of a floating island of trash or a junkyard in space. However, if you were to actually go up there, your reaction would probably be along the lines of, "So where is all this orbiting debris I was hearing about?"

There's stuff up there, but it only ever becomes a problem once in a while. If you were up there, even for a few months, you still would be unlikely to even see any. As for Earth having rings of trash... not likely. There is maybe a few hundred tons of "trash" in relatively stable orbit. This includes everything from satelites which no longer function to the occasional wrench dropped by NASA astronauts. Planetary rings occur when a moon is within the Roche limit of a planet. The tidal forces rip the moon apart into rubble and that becomes a ring around the planet. Even a small moon weighs thousands of giga-tons! That is many orders of magnitude difference in mass between what we've put up there and what is needed to create a plantary ring. So there is really a zero chance that we will ever create trash rings around our planet.

 

[salem80]

the need to WALL-E big bother

 

[athreex]

[citation][nom]fulle[/nom]I know how NASA feels. I barely dodged an encounter with my horrible ex girlfriend today, by about 2 miles. I might need to relocate.[/citation]

Yeah..and the worst part is...these girls come faster than the debris.