Astronauts Threatened by Great Danger on Their Next Space Mission

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson recently announced that the existence of space debris could become a problem and prevent astronauts from returning to space.

While the launch of at least 20,000 additional satellites is planned for the next 20 years, a problem begins to appear in Space: that of space waste. In effect, millions of debris are now in orbit and could jeopardize future missions.

Space debris is a threat to the future

If the NASA administrator recently said about space debris: “Space is the new Wild West, we gotta be the sheriff”, more details on the subject were provided on Friday, September 16, 2022, during the european interparliamentary conference on space. Indeed, Sophie Primas, the LR president explained: “The proliferation of objects and infrastructures put into orbit greatly increases the risks of collision, explosion and accident..

For his part, Josef Aschbacher, the director of the European Space Agency (ESA) explained that space junk was being become a threat pour satellites and astronauts. “Once a week we have these collision avoidance maneuvers to protect our satellites from this debris. It’s an increasingly common problem.” he confided.

Cleaning up space waste becomes essential

Most craft sent into space are not properly desorbed, which causes their debris to end up orbiting the Earth at a speed of more than 8km/s. If his waste became too numerous, a chain reaction could then occur, making it impossible exit from the atmosphere.

Today, NASA and ESA are working together to find solutions to avoid the accumulation of debris. If one of the solutions envisaged is to put in place strict rules concerning the way of deorbiting the machines, another is to clean up space. Indeed, the private company ClearSpace is preparing to leave for the first time in space in 2026. Its objective will be to recover debris for ESA. The cost of the operation is already estimated at nearly 100 million euros. An essential mission, however, to begin to clean space of all its waste.

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