NASA's Top 10 Space Junk Missions

Ant writes "NASA has identified the top ten space junk missions and said over 19,000 pieces of space junk are known to exist..." That's nothing: You should see my living room.

Re:Space sized bin bag

[srothroc]

What nation wants to spend money to send people up into space to clean up after what's essentially other people's garbage? There's no immediate gain, so nobody's going to do it.

Re:Space sized bin bag

[Tisha_AH]

Much of the space debris is in very small pieces like paint chips, pieces of thermal blankets, screws/nuts/bolts, etc..

The volume of near space that is "polluted" is vast. It is a constantly evolving three dimensional environment with debris moving at all sorts of crazy trajectories that change frequently depending upon the solar wind, geomagnetic field and the swelling and contraction of our tenuous upper atmosphere.

It would be like searching the beach in Fiji, looking for a particular 1957 nickel. The efforts to chase down each individual piece of trash is much greater than the risks of that particular piece.

We need to;
1. Stop spewing little parts, disgards and trash into space.
2. Do a better job of tracking what is up there.
3. Harden satellites to be able to survive the impact from a very small object.
4. Come up with a clean way to dispose of old space hardware other than abandonment in "graveyard orbits".
 

Re:Space sized bin bag

[GaryOlson]

Sure. The same method as used to clean up the largest portion of the oil spill in the Gulf....don't allow anyone to take pictures.

recycling

[pha7boy]

If we could monetize recycling in space, we'd clear that area up in quick order. maybe once private space flight and delivery takes off, someone will find a way to gather, break down, and recycle all the (otherwise very expensive) stuff up there.