Indianapolis (IN) - Pages 24 and 25 of the September 12, 2008 issue of New Scientist magazine have an article describing in detail the dangers in near-Earth space from more than 10,000 pieces of debris orbiting right now. The volume of space junk continues to grow and is causing more and more hazards to flight plans. The New Scientist article suggests a type of "Space Traffic Control" division is needed to monitor all of the debris, then making the data available through a central system. But the editors at TG Daily believe there's a more appropriate question that needs to be asked: Is it time to create an International Space Trucker fleet designed to safely capture and dispose of all this space junk?
Most of the orbiting debris comes from spent satellites disintegrating over time, or jetisoned rocket stages and launch-time components. While these all pose notable dangers to active space flight as their numbers are increasing, in January, 2007 we entered a new era. For the first time in recorded history, a ballistic missile was used to destroy an orbiting satellite. It was a terrorist action by the People's Liberation Army against China, but that act ultimatley sent a cloud of debris into mid- and low-Earth orbits. The cloud is now causing a significant amount of danger because there are so many large pieces (10cm or larger) falling through highly traveled space lanes.
Space debris is dangerous because of its high speeds. Without air resistance to slow it down, the pieces of debris continue accelerating toward the Earth. Even a 1cm piece of debris could strike with enough force to puncture the outer hull of a spacecraft or satellite, sending it right through the craft's innards, cutting electrical wires, hydraulic lines or damaging computer components, all of which could be fatal to both man and machine.
Even in past decades when there was less junk up there than today, space flights were subject to damage from the debris. In 1991 the Space Shuttle Discovery had to change its scheduled flight plan to avoid a failing soviet satellite that was on its way to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere. In 1996 the first true collision came when a discarded Ariane rocket stage collided with a French satellite. This caused significant damage to its stabalization controls, though the satellite was ultimately saved. And earlier this year, the International Space Station (ISS) had to make a course correction adjusting its orbit to avoid hitting some of the falling debris. Moving the ISS is a big deal and such a decision would not have been made were it not extremely vital.
All of these examples represent only a small fraction of the total number of changes required though. To successfully navigate the ever populating space above our planet original flight plans are computed specifically to avoid known pieces of debris. It's when the unknown ones show up that the in-flight changes occur, and this is happening more and more.
Therefore, we believe it's time for a Space Trucker Fleet to be created, one which operates remotely piloted vehicles designed to move from debris piece to debris piece slowly over time. Each piece will be captured by a type of claw or chain. Then it will be towed to a holding orbit, deposited into a specially fabricated net before ultimately attaching some paylod assist rockets and sending the entire kit and kaboodle directly toward our sun where it will burn up and pose no additional danger.
We believe this could take on one of two forms. Due to high cost it would most likely need to be an international effort, either through a direct government program or through the funding of a private effort through government funding.
We have already seen at least one successful, privately funded space effort, namely Spaceship One, designed by Burt Rutan's spacecraft company, Scaled Composites, LLC, funded by Paul G. Allen of Microsoft. In 2004, that very spacecraft went into low Earth orbit and returned successfully, piloted by non-astronaut Mike Melvill. Rutan's company won the government's $10 million X-Prize for the effort, even though the craft cost more than $10 million to construct.
Rutan is now working on his next endeavor, a space tourism company. He's being funded by British billionaire Richard Branson to develop a reusable craft that will carry two pilots and six passengers into space, each paying about $200,000 for the trip. This will ultimately prove if privately funded space efforts are really possible.
Still, the idea of sending up unmanned crafts seems the far better solution. They could be designed without crew concerns, being made of much heavier material, standard components able to be fixed by other similar craft in space. Essentially, an autonomous organization comprised of 50 such vehicles would be created with one purose in mind: capture all of the spent space debris from now on. This would be the sole purpose of the agency. And as such, every worldwide space effort would report to this agency whenever one of their satellites or other craft was damaged or needed to be decomissioned. It would be put into a schedule for pickup and retrieval, storage and eventual destruction.
Such an effort would require only a type of permanent docking platform (like a mini ISS) which would allow for refueling and maintenance. It could be serviced by future low-cost unmanned rocket flights, delivering whatever components are required. And while such an effort might be relatively slow to move all of the piece of debris into storage, over the next 10 years it would capture enough of the major items that from such a time forward their efforts should be sufficient to keep up with the growing number of debris pieces.
And finally, there would likely be a significant amount of mining that could take place on the captured pieces of equipment. Exotic metals, computer components, solar panels, special liquids resistant to extreme temperatures, etc., could all be obtained and put into "Return to Earth" (R2E) modules at the permanent station. Once full, the R2E is sent via a known return trajectory to Earth where it is picked up by ocean vessels. Such an effort would likely not turn a profit, but it would make possible the recycling of extremely complex, expensive and difficult-to-manufacture products used in satellites today. Plus, I'd imagine some governments would pay big bucks to retrieve certain components which may contain sensitive information.
Conclusion
We are polluting the space above our Earth. It is filled with manmade debris which, while unlikely to harm the Earth or the people on it, is growing ever more likely to harm future space endeavors. Ultimately such an agency will be required, whether it ultimately involves something like simply blasing space debris with phasers (thereby disintegrating it without capture), or actually capturing it. Something will eventually be required to keep the growing debris at bay. And what we propose is a new agency whose sole purpose is to seek out dead satellites and spent stages, boldly going where no man has gone before.
Care to sign up to be the first to pilot a real space vehicle, and not just a 3D space game's vehicle?
Most of the orbiting debris comes from spent satellites disintegrating over time, or jetisoned rocket stages and launch-time components. While these all pose notable dangers to active space flight as their numbers are increasing, in January, 2007 we entered a new era. For the first time in recorded history, a ballistic missile was used to destroy an orbiting satellite. It was a terrorist action by the People's Liberation Army against China, but that act ultimatley sent a cloud of debris into mid- and low-Earth orbits. The cloud is now causing a significant amount of danger because there are so many large pieces (10cm or larger) falling through highly traveled space lanes.
Space debris is dangerous because of its high speeds. Without air resistance to slow it down, the pieces of debris continue accelerating toward the Earth. Even a 1cm piece of debris could strike with enough force to puncture the outer hull of a spacecraft or satellite, sending it right through the craft's innards, cutting electrical wires, hydraulic lines or damaging computer components, all of which could be fatal to both man and machine.
Even in past decades when there was less junk up there than today, space flights were subject to damage from the debris. In 1991 the Space Shuttle Discovery had to change its scheduled flight plan to avoid a failing soviet satellite that was on its way to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere. In 1996 the first true collision came when a discarded Ariane rocket stage collided with a French satellite. This caused significant damage to its stabalization controls, though the satellite was ultimately saved. And earlier this year, the International Space Station (ISS) had to make a course correction adjusting its orbit to avoid hitting some of the falling debris. Moving the ISS is a big deal and such a decision would not have been made were it not extremely vital.
All of these examples represent only a small fraction of the total number of changes required though. To successfully navigate the ever populating space above our planet original flight plans are computed specifically to avoid known pieces of debris. It's when the unknown ones show up that the in-flight changes occur, and this is happening more and more.
Therefore, we believe it's time for a Space Trucker Fleet to be created, one which operates remotely piloted vehicles designed to move from debris piece to debris piece slowly over time. Each piece will be captured by a type of claw or chain. Then it will be towed to a holding orbit, deposited into a specially fabricated net before ultimately attaching some paylod assist rockets and sending the entire kit and kaboodle directly toward our sun where it will burn up and pose no additional danger.
We believe this could take on one of two forms. Due to high cost it would most likely need to be an international effort, either through a direct government program or through the funding of a private effort through government funding.
We have already seen at least one successful, privately funded space effort, namely Spaceship One, designed by Burt Rutan's spacecraft company, Scaled Composites, LLC, funded by Paul G. Allen of Microsoft. In 2004, that very spacecraft went into low Earth orbit and returned successfully, piloted by non-astronaut Mike Melvill. Rutan's company won the government's $10 million X-Prize for the effort, even though the craft cost more than $10 million to construct.
Rutan is now working on his next endeavor, a space tourism company. He's being funded by British billionaire Richard Branson to develop a reusable craft that will carry two pilots and six passengers into space, each paying about $200,000 for the trip. This will ultimately prove if privately funded space efforts are really possible.
Still, the idea of sending up unmanned crafts seems the far better solution. They could be designed without crew concerns, being made of much heavier material, standard components able to be fixed by other similar craft in space. Essentially, an autonomous organization comprised of 50 such vehicles would be created with one purose in mind: capture all of the spent space debris from now on. This would be the sole purpose of the agency. And as such, every worldwide space effort would report to this agency whenever one of their satellites or other craft was damaged or needed to be decomissioned. It would be put into a schedule for pickup and retrieval, storage and eventual destruction.
Such an effort would require only a type of permanent docking platform (like a mini ISS) which would allow for refueling and maintenance. It could be serviced by future low-cost unmanned rocket flights, delivering whatever components are required. And while such an effort might be relatively slow to move all of the piece of debris into storage, over the next 10 years it would capture enough of the major items that from such a time forward their efforts should be sufficient to keep up with the growing number of debris pieces.
And finally, there would likely be a significant amount of mining that could take place on the captured pieces of equipment. Exotic metals, computer components, solar panels, special liquids resistant to extreme temperatures, etc., could all be obtained and put into "Return to Earth" (R2E) modules at the permanent station. Once full, the R2E is sent via a known return trajectory to Earth where it is picked up by ocean vessels. Such an effort would likely not turn a profit, but it would make possible the recycling of extremely complex, expensive and difficult-to-manufacture products used in satellites today. Plus, I'd imagine some governments would pay big bucks to retrieve certain components which may contain sensitive information.
Conclusion
We are polluting the space above our Earth. It is filled with manmade debris which, while unlikely to harm the Earth or the people on it, is growing ever more likely to harm future space endeavors. Ultimately such an agency will be required, whether it ultimately involves something like simply blasing space debris with phasers (thereby disintegrating it without capture), or actually capturing it. Something will eventually be required to keep the growing debris at bay. And what we propose is a new agency whose sole purpose is to seek out dead satellites and spent stages, boldly going where no man has gone before.
Care to sign up to be the first to pilot a real space vehicle, and not just a 3D space game's vehicle?