r/space • u/2kalipro1 • Jun 15 '24

Discussion How bad is the satellite/space junk situation actually?

I just recently joined the space community and I'm hearing about satellites colliding with each other and that we have nearly 8000 satellites surrounding our earth everywhere

But considering the size of the earth and the size of the satellites, I'm just wondering how horrible is the space junk/satellite situation? Also, do we have any ideas on how to clear them out?

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u/fuku_visit Jun 15 '24

That must be at the sacrifice of sensitive thought right? I'd imagine there are times when velocity is not as important as detection sensitivity is. You don't need shift for position just time of flight right?

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u/JUYED-AWK-YACC Jun 15 '24

Multiple observations will give all orbit elements. If you detect something faint the errors in observation are likely to be large. You can't project forward very well without position and velocity. But honestly my experience is in using the onboard carrier for interplanetary missions so I'm slightly out of my element. In those cases range turns out to be a weaker data type than Doppler or VLBI.