Member of the Month

KilaTsunami
October, 2024

Online

Welcome to the Newschoolers forums! You may read the forums as a guest, however you must be a registered member to post. Register to become a member today!

We sure like to litter a lot

profile picture
Pman13a
Posts: 3800 - Karma: 452
click on the link for more, but there is a ton or crap orbiting our earth now because of our satellites

http://gizmodo.com/378713/space-is-full-of-crap

The European Space Agency has just released images showing all the satellites and human-made debris now orbiting space as a result of 51 years of launching stuff to space since Sputnik launched in 1957. That's about 6,000 satellites up there—of which only 800 remain operational—plus thousands of other objects from launches and accidents. According to their mindblowing simulations things are getting a lot worse: About 50 percent of all trackable objects are due to in-orbit explosion events (about 200) or collision events (less than 10). Yes, we knew that there was a lot of crap out there, but not to this extent. According to the ESA, this is really bad news and urgent measures are needed. Explosions in space are not disastrous on their own, but because of its aftermath. One example: a geostationary satellite travels at 6,213 miles per hour. If it explodes, all the debris stays near the orbit forming a cloud around the Earth within a few days






Apr 11 2008 12:08PM
0 0
profile picture
Tolz
Posts: 1882 - Karma: 27
um...ok
Apr 11 2008 12:08PM
0 0
profile picture
Dustin.
Posts: 13839 - Karma: 7,704
Who cares?  Space is big and what comes down get burned up in the atmosphere.  I think there are  bigger problems than space shit.
Apr 11 2008 12:22PM
0 0
profile picture
Pman13a
Posts: 3800 - Karma: 452
it is all in our orbit, going around at about 6,213 miles per hour
a lot of it is debris from explosions and such.  If we are trying to launch a space ship, what would happen if a random piece of debris, which we would have no way of tracking, crashes into the ship?
Apr 11 2008 2:01PM
0 0
profile picture
Alexander_Keith
Posts: 3204 - Karma: 25
bingo
Apr 11 2008 3:05PM
0 0
profile picture
RudyGarmisch
Posts: 25443 - Karma: 13,844
The problem is that much of this debris is in perpetual orbits that other satellites and spacecraft use. Collisions of a pea sized object going 17,000 mph are extremely hazardous. Basically, we continue to fill up our orbit with debris, eventually anything we put up there will be destroyed quickly.

By the way, that incident a few months ago where China blew up one of its satellites: Basically doubled the amount of micro debris up there. Way to go China.
Apr 11 2008 3:12PM
0 0
profile picture
Delphi
Posts: 3748 - Karma: 36
send it into the sun
Apr 11 2008 3:46PM
0 0
profile picture
DudeAbides
Posts: 333 - Karma: 10
space junk rocks.
Apr 11 2008 4:57PM
0 0
profile picture
Reed.S
Posts: 1126 - Karma: 10
cool
Apr 11 2008 5:06PM
0 0
profile picture
SolMi
Posts: 337 - Karma: 14
thank you i was going to say this +karma

this would also work with trash. earth is running out of space for trash to be safely disposed of, send it to the sun it will likely burn up before it even hits the sun and we will have a cleaner earth
Apr 11 2008 9:41PM
0 0
profile picture
BootySpunk.
Posts: 8148 - Karma: 84
What happened to all that debris from the satelite the US blew up a while back?
Apr 11 2008 9:46PM
0 0
profile picture
Meh42
Posts: 2431 - Karma: 14
The thurst required to clear the atmosphere is so ridiculously cost prohibitive it's not even funny.
Apr 11 2008 9:55PM
0 0
profile picture
StanMcStanson
Posts: 2773 - Karma: 11
Yeah, and the other reason is that aliens would have to kill us if we managed to pollute the rest of our solar system, not just our planet.  I imagine that they probably think we're going to kill ourselves off in a few thousand years, so we're not worth the effort for them to wipe us out.
Apr 11 2008 9:57PM
0 0
profile picture
SolMi
Posts: 337 - Karma: 14
so it's not worth the cost to clean up the earth we are running out of land for trash so quickly i know it would be spendy but i think it would be worth it

and it wouldn't pollute our solar system if it goes into the sun because it would just burn right up and be gone forever
Apr 11 2008 10:19PM
0 0
profile picture
RudyGarmisch
Posts: 25443 - Karma: 13,844
Apparently we detonated it at a different angle so that the debris would impact the atmosphere and burn up.
Apr 11 2008 10:23PM
0 0
profile picture
Meh42
Posts: 2431 - Karma: 14
Yeah, it's great.  The thing is we're not talking just modestly expensive.  We're talking probably a trillion or so dollars just to get rid of half of New Jersey's trash.

  If that whole space elevator thing ever becomes more than a science fiction writer's wet dream it might be possible.
Apr 11 2008 10:26PM
0 0
profile picture
ride-rider
Posts: 1761 - Karma: 20
i no a guy that did the "adopt a highway" thing, he cleaned his 2 mile stretch of highway 4 times a year.  each time he collected 500lbs of trash.

FUCK PEOPLE JUST RECYCLE IT, OR THROW IT AWAY!!!!
Apr 11 2008 10:40PM
0 0
All times are Eastern (-5)