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Space Junk Passes 'Tipping Point'

Report urges NASA to ramp up efforts quickly

By John Johnson, Newser Staff

Posted Sep 1, 2011 5:11 PM CDT

(Newser) – Astronauts on the International Space Station had a close call with space debris in June, and things are only going to get worse from here on out, warns a new report. In fact, the amount of junk orbiting earth has now passed the "tipping point," says the National Research Council. It calls for NASA to get a better handle on the problem quickly and for the US to enlist the help of other nations to figure out solutions, reports the Washington Post.

“We’re going to have a lot more [debris] collisions, and at an increasingly frequent rate,” says a former NASA scientist who helped draft the report. It's not just astronauts at risk: Multimillion-dollar satellites can be rendered useless when even a small piece of debris hits them. And in a vicious cycle, the more collisions that happen, the more debris is created. We'll hope discarded pizza boxes don't add to the problem.

This computer generated graphic provided by NASA shows images of debris in Earth's orbit that are currently being tracked. (AP Photo/NASA)

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COMMENTS

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Showing 3 of 30 comments

HappyHabenero

Sep 4, 2011 7:16 AM CDT

That's a Lot of precious metals up there. I'm sure a solar powered ion rocket for guidance and some very large nets could be interesting... A little carbon fiber mesh can cover a large area. In principle like a shrimping net

jazzee

Sep 2, 2011 11:08 AM CDT

Dear Team and readers, as a participant of Singularity University '11 at NASA Ames, I would be very happy to share with you my video about space debris : http://twitc.com/Prx1eWiui I hope you will like it and feel free to publish it and share it. Jaz.

AYBABTU

Sep 2, 2011 8:00 AM CDT

Looks like a scene from WALL*E. Thanks Buy-n-Large!

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Space Junk Passes 'Tipping Point'

Report urges NASA to ramp up efforts quickly

OTHER STORIES ON OUR RADAR

NASA • space debris • outer space • space junk • National Research Council

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