Five things you should know about space junk - Air Force News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Air Force Times

Five things you should know about space junk

Remember “Lost in Space,” the 1960s TV show about the extraterrestrial adventures of the Robinson family and their faithful robot? Well, today those three words describe thousands of satellites, space probes and pieces of junk floating above the old blue marble. U.S. Strategic Command, headed by Air Force Gen. Kevin Chilton, is responsible for keeping track of all that stuff. It’s a big job — and a top priority of the Defense Department. Now, read on so you don’t seem “spacey” when you’re talking with your fellow airmen ...

1. It’s a bird. It’s a plane. No, it’s ...

At some time or other, you can find just about anything in space — from busted-up satellites (still there) to the ashes of “Star Trek” creator Gene Roddenberry (delivered by NASA in 1992, disintegrated now). Astronauts, of course, lose or leave stuff a lot, from their pee (quick frozen by the cold) to the glove let go by the first American spacewalker, Ed White. The glove burned up about a month later. And the oldest piece of space junk: the U.S.-launched Vanguard I satellite. It went up in 1958 and is still circling.

2. Your eyes on the sky.

Srategic Command’s Joint Space Operations Center, or JSpOC, at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., monitors space junk 24/7 with radar and other optical detectors. It’s key to helping fight the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. A frequent request comes from pilots who fly aircraft with older GPS units. What they want to know: Are there satellites in the right positions for their units to work?

3. Hey, look out!

The first major space collision of two satellites happened only this year. On Feb. 10, a deactivated Kosmos-2251 and an operational Iridium 33 hit each other over northern Siberia going nearly 26,200 mph. Ka-boom. Both satellites were totaled. To see wreckage of 33, visit Spaceweather’s satellite tracker at www.spaceweather.com/flybys/ and type in your ZIP code.

4. Take cover — NOT.

An Oklahoma woman is the only human on record hit by a piece of orbital debris (aka space junk). In 1997, Lottie Williams took it on the shoulder with a 4-by-5-inch piece of material later confirmed to be part of a Delta II rocket fuel tank that had launched an Air Force satellite a year earlier. Luckily, she wasn’t hurt.

5. Get out the vacuum.

Experts have toyed with the idea of “sweeping” space debris back into Earth’s atmosphere. Possible cleaning tools: an automated tug or a laser broom. Forget about ice bullets, though, to take out the trash. They can be considered weapons in space, a no-no.

Related reading

* Air Force budgets $506M to track space junk

* More stats from the Joint Space Operations Center