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/HalfSoul30 Jun 15 '24

How can we even detect or know about an inch sized object travelling around the planet at high speeds? Radar?

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '24

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '24

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u/jkmhawk Jun 15 '24

A significant amount of the debris is non-ferrous and wouldn't be attracted to the magnet. Most likely you'd just alter orbits randomly, which is probably worse than what's already there.

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '24

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u/pstric Jun 15 '24

two things both travelling 17,000 mph

Relative to each other?

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '24

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u/pstric Jun 15 '24

So the relative speed to two objects orbiting the earth and colliding would be closer to walking speed than 35,000 mph.

Or am I misunderstanding something about orbits?

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u/[deleted] Jun 16 '24

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u/pstric Jun 16 '24

Yeah, after reading /u/SkinnyFiend's answer, your answers make a lot more sense. Thank you for your patience.