Visualizations Show the Extensive Cloud of Debris Russia's Anti-Satellite Test Created (theverge.com) 77
Satellite trackers have been working overtime to figure out just how much dangerous debris Russia created when it destroyed one of its own satellites early Monday -- and the picture they've painted looks bleak. Multiple visual simulations of Russia's anti-satellite, or ASAT, test show a widespread cloud of debris that will likely menace other objects in orbit for years. The Verge reports: It's going to take weeks or even months to fully understand just how bad the situation is, but early visualizations of the ASAT test created by satellite trackers show an extensive trail of space debris left in the wake of the breakup. The fragments appear like a dotted snake in orbit, stretching out and moving in roughly the same direction that Kosmos 1408 used to move around Earth. And there's one thing the visualizers agree on: this snake of debris isn't going anywhere anytime soon. "There will be some potential collision risk to most satellites in [low Earth orbit] from the fragmentation of Cosmos 1408 over the next few years to decades," LeoLabs, a private space tracking company in the US, wrote in a blog post.
Two visualizations created by the European Union's Space Surveillance and Tracking (SST) network and space software company AGI reveal what likely happened in the first moment of impact when Russia's missile intercepted Kosmos 1408. They both show how the debris cloud grew instantly and spread throughout space. AGI's simulation also shows just how close the cloud comes to intersecting with the International Space Station, validating NASA's concerns and the agency's decision to have the astronauts shelter in place.
Another visualization created by Hugh Lewis, a professor of engineering at the University of Southampton specializing in space debris, shows just how widely the debris from Kosmos 1408 has spread out in space. Lewis explains that when Russia's missile hit the satellite, each of the fragments that were created got a little kick, sending them to higher and lower altitudes. Each piece is moving at a different speed depending on the height of its orbit. Lewis says that the cloud will continue to morph over time. The debris fragments in the lower orbits will fall to Earth and out of orbit more quickly, while the ones in higher orbits will stay in space much longer.
Two visualizations created by the European Union's Space Surveillance and Tracking (SST) network and space software company AGI reveal what likely happened in the first moment of impact when Russia's missile intercepted Kosmos 1408. They both show how the debris cloud grew instantly and spread throughout space. AGI's simulation also shows just how close the cloud comes to intersecting with the International Space Station, validating NASA's concerns and the agency's decision to have the astronauts shelter in place.
Another visualization created by Hugh Lewis, a professor of engineering at the University of Southampton specializing in space debris, shows just how widely the debris from Kosmos 1408 has spread out in space. Lewis explains that when Russia's missile hit the satellite, each of the fragments that were created got a little kick, sending them to higher and lower altitudes. Each piece is moving at a different speed depending on the height of its orbit. Lewis says that the cloud will continue to morph over time. The debris fragments in the lower orbits will fall to Earth and out of orbit more quickly, while the ones in higher orbits will stay in space much longer.
Well... (Score:2, Informative)
-- Forrest Gump.
This wasn't stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
The Russians know exactly what they're doing. This was 2 warnings. The obvious one was we can destroy your satellites but the more subtle one was we can make LEO unusable if you push us.
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The Russians know exactly what they're doing. This was 2 warnings. The obvious one was we can destroy your satellites but the more subtle one was we can make LEO unusable if you push us.
They could have made the point that they can shoot down other people's satellites while still creating a cloud of debris significantly smaller than this one ... Stupid is as stupid does ...
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When power tripping psychopaths like Putin want to make a point they doesn't metaphorically slap you on the wrist, they punch your teeth down your throat then break a few of your ribs for good measure. Ask the Ukrainians and Georgians about that.
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And the third was that *other* satellite should stay away from ours. But that's just a rumor.
Re: This wasn't stupid (Score:1)
They need to clean it up (Score:3)
Re:They need to clean it up (Score:5, Interesting)
Putting pressure on Russia? They nicked a whole pensinsula from their neighbors and the international reaction was little more than "well, that isn't nice".
Russia basically has the whole of Europe at its balls with natural gas. If they put pressure on Russia, hell may not freeze over but Hell [wikipedia.org] might.
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Re: They need to clean it up I (Score:2)
Re:They need to clean it up (Score:5, Insightful)
Putting pressure on Russia? They nicked a whole pensinsula from their neighbors and the international reaction was little more than "well, that isn't nice".
Russia basically has the whole of Europe at its balls with natural gas ...
People keep saying that without backing it up but actually, no, Russia does not have Europe by the balls over Natural Gas. The US-Americans rage against European gas purchases from Russia. The US wants the EU to stop dealing with Russia altogether and buy US fracking gas instead and the US would presumably be willing to offer that gas at competitive prices. If the US can provide trans Atlantic gas shipments at competitive prices with Russia the US should stop complaining, come over here and compete with the Russia's Gazprom. Most European countries would welcome serious competition in the gas market since Russia is an abusive and corrupt monopolist over here. At worst relying on US gas supplies might be be a bit financially painful, but the Europeans can afford it and it would rob the Russians of one of their favourite economic extortion instruments. That alone would be worth paying a certain price difference. Russia, however, is a tinpot regional power with an economy smaller than that of the state of New York that is trying to play in the same league as the US and China and Russia will really miss the revenue stream from gas sales to Europe. Meanwhile the plan in large portions of Europe is to replace gas altogether with alternatives by 2050 and that effort is making excellent progress.
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Re: They need to shut it down. Shut it ALL down. (Score:1)
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I don't buy the 2050 date at all (just like the EU had bought enough vaccines for all of us right? they never make unrealistic projections right?).
Europe should have been wise enough to take off it's stupid "Atomkraft, nein danke" bumper stickers , stupid hippie ideals (I say hippie, because it definitely is not peaceniks, as they will beat you up for expressing support for nuclear power). and gone with more nuclear power decades ago.
Instead we have decades of coal ash and now have to deal with dictators f
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... just like the EU had bought enough vaccines for all of us right? ...
Stop spreading FUD. The EU have ordered over 2 billion doses of vaccines already. Assuming you aren't an anti-vaxxer, and assuming you want to be vaccinated, any failure to vaccinate you is a failure of your government to do so. The vaccines are available from the EU and the EU27 (76.4%) have already out-performed both the UK (68%) and US (59%) on vaccination rates. The EU's biggest mistake so far was trusting the British Tories and AstraZeneca.
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You can blame the brits all you want, I can't stand AstraZeneca or the Tories, but the initial vaccine purchasing strategy of the EC was stupid. The strategy assumed that pretty much all of the vaccines would be successful at the beginning.
LATER after they realised their mistake, but the availability was initially piss poor and cost 6-10 Weeks precious time that could have been used to make sure that variants were even more isolated by the mid-summer.
So I am very skeptical about how fast the EU can do th
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Helping Europe get an alternative to natural gas would be such a good investment in geopolitics -- and in dealing with climate change.
I wonder how much the anti-nuclear movement in Germany and other places was helped by Russian propaganda?
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I wonder how much the anti-nuclear movement in Germany and other places was helped by Russian propaganda?
Uh? There is no anti nuclear government in Germany.
It is pro nuclear. Are you an idiot?
The previous government - under Schroeder - was voted into power explicitly to break out of nuclear power. The successor - the Merkel government - reverted the decissions and tried to keep the nuclear reactors run longer. After Fukushima she realized: either quit, or risk riots and a civil war.
And why you think that th
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That is not what happened. What the Russians telegraphed was that they were not going to let Crimea go, that it was of critical importance to them. So a status quo was fine. The moment Ukranian generals stated their intent to move and take control over Crimea Russia decided that they would ignore international law and they annexed it.
Annexing territory which is sympathetic to you is not allowed. Of course it is a bit borderline because what if you first strongly support separatism in that territory, so they
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They nicked a whole pensinsula from their neighbors and the international reaction was little more than "well, that isn't nice".
Which was/is inhabited by %gt; 50% Russians. Big deal.
What exactly would you expect west Europe to do when Russia takes an area they "think" belongs to them because before Ukraine was independent: it belonged to them? Hu?
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Which was/is inhabited by 50% Russians. Big deal.
Sort of like Tibet is inhabited by Chinese.
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Tibet is not inhabited by Chinese.
So: what is your point?
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There was no "argument".
I pointed out a fact.
Ukraine once belonged to Russia, hence Crimea was a "bad loss" to them, and they "wanted it back" for several reasons.
Tibet used to be its own state, depending how you want to define "state" in a region where "ownership" of land constantly changed (half of China once belonged to Tibet), and Tibet was conquered at the end of WWII.
So: there is no arguing about anything. Except that many /. ers simply want to frame Russia as the arch enemy.
The correct way to have ha
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Absolutely Russia is a shithole dictatorship, as is China. Not blaming the people in any case, sad they are disenfranchised and being occupied. Happens a lot.
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What do you think Russia would do if Germany decides that Königsberg should be German again?
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No idea.
and what is your question aiming at? No idea either.
Re: They need to clean it up (Score:2)
There seem to be a lot of things you don't have any idea about. Maybe read more and type less, and see how that goes.
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As I spent 90% of my time reading: that is a bit difficult.
So if you have a point, make it. Or don't. Up to you.
I'm not good at "reading between the lines".
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What do you think Russia would do if NATO decides Ukraine is NATO?
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Why do you think the Ukraine isn't yet in the NATO... It would be nukes in Turkey (back from the 1960s) all over again.
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Yes the Russians are very explicit that this would mean war. And that is the only thing which may stop NATO, or at least make them hesitate. They were less forceful in their opposition about the rest of NATO expansion and look what happened. But somehow you think Russia is the problem. We have stated goals of regime change in Russia and Belarus. and currently NATO is trying to bring down Lukashenko. All innocently of course. Organic. entirely domestic issue as always. Because when we do it then we are not d
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Russia basically has the whole of Europe at its balls with natural gas. If they put pressure on Russia, hell may not freeze over but Hell [wikipedia.org] might.
You picked the worst place to make your point. Hell is in Norway. Guess which country has a metric fuckton of oil and gas reserves?
That's right:
- https://www.worldometers.info/... [worldometers.info]
- https://www.worldometers.info/... [worldometers.info]
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Yes, but there are no other places that are called hell in Europe.
I know that Norway is basically the only country in Europe that could flip Russia off, at least when it comes to gas and oil. But the religious should really start to wonder why their god thought it's a swell idea to put half their precious oil into the middle east and the rest in a country where Hell is located...
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Was Putin bad boy? Maybe ask him very politely and he will clean up mess, da?
No, he'll probably just make like a Byzantine courtier and poison you
consequences of putin... (Score:5, Informative)
So far the consequences of putin ruling Russia as it's 'president', president in quotes, he never won any real elections, all elections he 'won' was always a game of rigging so called threats to Russia where he never had to debate any real opponents. He was put into power by Yeltsin, who needed someone that would protect Yeltsin after that drunken bastard left his post. At least Yeltsin left and didn't embarrass himself further, this one is a source of constant embarrassment but he also a threat. He is not only a threat to the people of Russia, he is a threat to the environment, threat to global peace, threat to the idea that people can actually trust anything anywhere at all.
putin is a little goblin, who wears funny shoes to make himself look taller, he is a thief, a warmonger, a war profiteer, a murderer on the global scale, a supporter of terrorists around the world and a threat to environment on a global scale, not just on a local scale. The deforestation, fires, chemical spills, unspent jet fuel spills, air pollution, nuclear pollution, now space pollution... He murdered tens of thousands and he caused millions to live in poverty. Of-course he is personification of the larger problem in Russia but he is a very apt personification at it. There are more political prisoners in Russia today than there were in the late stages of the former USSR https://memohrc.org/ru/pzk-lis... [memohrc.org]
Everything, from the explosions of apartment buildings in Russia that allowed putin to come to power https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] to Kursk submarine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] to murders of dissidents and journalists https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org], to Navalny https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] and his political imprisonment after an unsuccessful attempt at murdering him with Novichok https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] even to the current Belarus immigrant crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] and hundreds of the so called 'natural disasters' that ail Russia for the last couple of decades, all of this is the result of policy of scorched earth that putin is pursuing.
This space junk incident is not an accident and it is not something that was done by mistake or a miscalculation, this was done on purpose, there are many reasons for it. For example Russia is falling behind in the Space exploration, so why not just make it more difficult for everyone to be there, if you cannot make it ahead, lets pull everyone else back. Also contaminating space may damage foreign satellites and putin actually wants that to happen. He is scared of any type of uncensored access to information, he wants Russians to be kept as much in the dark as possible, so why not destroy access to space and prevent satellite Internet from happening? There are reasons, all of them are pathetic, all of them are in the spirit of the tiny, puny, scared fucking piece of shit goblin that is destroying lives of millions by stealing everything from them.
Re:consequences of putin... (Score:4, Interesting)
Not sure why downvoted. You don't make brilliant points but fair ones nonetheless.
I think you should discuss China though. China and Russia are generally considered strong allies. China is now beginning to gain a dominate foothold in the space race, so in doing this Russia could see some flak from China. So I wonder if the orbit in question has more negative consequences for the ISS than the one China is working on.
We can also ask, will China put pressure on Russia over this or was it may be even done with relative consent?
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Not sure why downvoted? Most old white dudes are republicans. Most of slashdot is old white dudes. Most Republicans are Trump supporters. Trump loves Pooty-poot. I feel like offering to graph this for you is insulting, but please forgive me if you suffer from an affliction that renders you unable to draw conclusions.
So your racism and sexism are somehow good arguments? Weird.
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Age and whiteness (and maleness, if you intend "dude" to be gender-specific) are correlated with trumpism, but education is strongly anticorrelated.
Re: consequences of putin... (Score:1)
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China and Russia were allies in WWII. And probably still in the Korean war.
Now: it is 2021. Perhaps you missed the clock ticking.
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China and Russia have extended their treaties of mutual support. China and Russia are making agreements for moon exploration. I mean we can go through the tally of Chinese allies and we are basically easily saying Russia is top 3. Pakistan is probably number 1 but then again China's relationships are very contingent (though I think the US can be very similar). Though we could say the future of China and Afghanistan might challenge it's relationship with Pakistan. Likewise there are many challenges with Rus
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I do not think China has any allies.
But if you think they have, up to you.
North Korea perhaps - on paper?
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North Korea is more a thorn in the side. It's really the same story repeated. The more countries like America or China try to spread their doctrine, the more those places become problematic in one way or another.
If we say China has no allies, then that "degree" of definition requires us to effectively say the US has no allies. They are in similar positions. Both treat their allies economically at times worse than their opponents but they still depend on those allies for the "checks and balances" of white vs
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Pretty insightful post.
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So nice of you to precisely describe yourself in the very first sentence.
Re: consequences of putin... (Score:2)
History of orbital debris (Score:5, Interesting)
This video [youtube.com] shows the history of space debris since the start of the space race.
Only Russia? (Score:2)
Is this the first instance of purposefully fragmenting a satellite in orbit? USA has apparently done it at least once with a de-orbiting satellite, but that debris wouldn't be forever harmful like this.
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Would not want to be stuck on ISS.. cf. Planetes (Score:2)
Dammit. So they have taken out an entire orbit and anything that crosses it ever is in danger. What impact on LEO satellite swarms? If I was going to orbit in the future I would definitely want to have a lot of delta-v and maneuverability in case of this kind of shit.
Flashback to PLANETES manga where they clean up space junk on scooter type craft..! (The title of the manga was in Cyrillic, how prescient!) Though I don't remember Russia being mentioned in the manga. The only Russian is a sympathetic characte
Retrotopia has Kessler Syndrome as a major theme (Score:2)
"Retrotopia [novel] by John Michael Greer (2016)"
https://www.goodreads.com/book... [goodreads.com]
"The year is 2065. Decades ago, the United States of America fell apart after four brutal years of civil war [related in part to widespread miscarriages from a biotech intervention and a subsequent coverup, among other things], and the fragments coalesced into new nations divided by economic and political rivalries. Most of the post-US America is wracked by poverty and civil strife, with high-tech skyscrapers rising above crow
Remove old satellites first (Score:4, Interesting)
One could start with removing old / dead satellites from space. Every 5000 kg. satellite that is removed from space (or moved to a safe "graveyard" orbit), is 5000 kg. material than can not be hit by space debris, and thus can't possibly become space debris itself at any point in the future.
There must be plenty of dead satellites by now. As for 'sensitive' (military / espionage type) satellites: either demonstrate it's still in use & under your control, or it's fair game for whatever party engaged in removing dead satellites.
Sure that doesn't take care of the problem of smaller bits out there, or active satellites. But removing all dead ones from the equation may help a great deal to prevent cascade effects.
What about Starlink? (Score:4, Interesting)
If there was ever a reason (Score:3)
Wrong (Score:2)
Time to step up and let the others know that they re wrong, and that it is simply not possible to cause a problem for years.
My own assessment was that the debris would be sent into differing orbits, depending on how the debris was accelerated or decelerated, and that gravity would spread the debris out over time. If it is up lo