In case 24 writers want to raise the bar, here’s something that should really freak you out:
For decades, space experts have worried that a speeding bit of orbital debris might one day smash a large spacecraft into hundreds of pieces and start a chain reaction, a slow cascade of collisions that would expand for centuries, spreading chaos through the heavens.
In the last decade or so, as scientists came to agree that the number of objects in orbit had surpassed a critical mass — or, in their terms, the critical spatial density, the point at which a chain reaction becomes inevitable — they grew more anxious.
Early this year, after a half-century of growth, the federal list of detectable objects (four inches wide or larger) reached 10,000, including dead satellites, spent rocket stages, a camera, a hand tool and junkyards of whirling debris left over from chance explosions and destructive tests.
Now, experts say, China’s test on Jan. 11 of an antisatellite rocket that shattered an old satellite into hundreds of large fragments means the chain reaction will most likely start sooner. If their predictions are right, the cascade could put billions of dollars’ worth of advanced satellites at risk and eventually threaten to limit humanity’s reach for the stars.
Federal and private experts say that early estimates of 800 pieces of detectable debris from the shattering of the satellite will grow to nearly 1,000 as observations continue by tracking radars and space cameras. At either number, it is the worst such episode in space history.
Today, next year or next decade, some piece of whirling debris will start the cascade, experts say.
“It’s inevitable,” said Nicholas L. Johnson, chief scientist for orbital debris at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. “A significant piece of debris will run into an old rocket body, and that will create more debris. It’s a bad situation.”
Geoffrey E. Forden, an arms expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is analyzing the Chinese satellite debris, said China perhaps failed to realize the magnitude of the test’s indirect hazards.
Dr. Forden suggested that Chinese engineers might have understood the risks but failed to communicate them. In China, he said, “the decision process is still so opaque that maybe they didn’t know who to talk to. Maybe you have a disconnect between the engineers and the people who think about policy.”
China, experts note, has 39 satellites of its own — many of them now facing a heightened risk of destruction.
Now Playing: Episode 350
Al Gore’s plan for energy independence, Obama’s trip overseas, and finally, the bailout of Fannie and Freddie.
Links Mentioned: Al Gore’s plan … articles on carbon-neutral communities in The New Yorker and the NYT.
Saw the headline and thought you were going to post something about the astronaut (poor, deranged woman).
Funny way for the US to start to drive a wedge between the public perception of “our” space weapons program vs “their” space weapons program. “Well at least OUR mad scientists think about things like the HORRIBLE chain reaction in space that’s going to rain debris down on all of us!”
Soon the majority of the American public is recognizing the morality of the two programs as different in kind, and not just in degree. Thereby allowing the hawks to continue their own space weapons programs unopposed by the majority of the public.
If I were going to comment on the BB gun-toting astronaut, it would absolutely include something along the lines of how she wore a space diaper so that she didn’t have to stop to pee during her 900-mile drive to get the other woman . . .
But back to the matter at hand — I actually don’t know, so this is a question — isn’t the U.S.’s proposed missile defense program shooting down things at an elevation much lower than the orbits described in the article?
The Chinese spokesperson made some comment about keeping space weapons free, but the gist of the article isn’t about that.
Keep an eye on this issue — I have a feeling it’s going to be the Y2K of the next century.