Internet Stuuffs

Why Doesn’t NASA Read Stuuffs?

9 days ago there was a collision in space that generated tons of space debris that experts claim could circle the globe for up to 10,000 years threatening satellites, space stations and astronauts/cosmonauts. Right now there is an international meeting of smart space type guys in Vienna Austria trying to come up with a plan.. and one of those ideas is to “go get the junk” according to an AP article posted on Yahoo! news.

If you recall back in March of last year I wrote about ideas for the future of space, the number one idea was a space ‘Junker’. With our society being all crazy about Green and recycling it’s amazing that we spend trillions of dollars every year just to destroy the satellites when they quit working. A space junker might not be the most glamorous job for Astronauts but it would give real world value to the materials up there and reduce the cost of building satellites. Imagine being able to scrap and recycle materials on the International Space Station or the Moon and build satellites in space. The savings on materials, cleanup and fuel cost would be enormous.

According to the article by the AP the ideas at the convention are to attach ballons to the debris to make it’s orbit degrade faster or to attach a 10-mile electrodynamic tether to generate a current controlled from the ground to drive the debris into Earth. If you can get that close to debris in space shouldnt we just recycle it?

Until then it seems most nations just want to keep sharing information about the debris and be reactive instead of proactive.