Messing up LEO and Endangering ISS

Recall a few weeks ago we had a little “oopsie” between a couple of satellites that resulted in both of them being broken apart into small chunks of debris. Some of that debris has started to fall through the atmosphere, and will likely burn up as it passes through or if any pieces survive and fall to Earth, they’d be “ghosts” of their former selves.

However, some of this material (tastefully renamed Micrometeroid Orbital Debris) could very likely pose a threat to the International Space Station. According to the NASA watch board NASA Spaceflight.com, the crew of the space station has been alerted that they may have to  move into the Soyuz capsule and possibly be prepared to leave the station due to a “red threshold late notice” they received about debris that could slam into the station. Given all the factors that affect the orbits of debris, it’s still not clear as of this morning (Thursday, March 12) whether the team will have to do this. (It’s getting clearer — see updates below.)

Note:  The piece of debris was a piece of a Payload Assist Module (got that info from the link above).  The ISS really dodged more than a bullet!

This problem raises the issue of just what we’ve done to junk up near-Earth space. It’s not just this satellite collision that groatied things up.  There has been space junk out there for years, ranging from stuff dropped during EVA missions to junk from intentionally destroyed satellites. It’s all out there, either raining down after years of atmospheric drag or plugging along in orbit, waiting for a chance collision with something like ISS or, worse, a shuttle or other launch vehicle ascending to orbit.

We’ve junked out Low Earth Orbit now — and there’s not a lot we can do to clean it up.  We have to dodge the junk in order to get to space, and once we’re there, we have to watch out for it.  Although space is big and the junk is small, this is still just a bit too much like the work-arounds we live with here on Earth to avoid drinking polluted water or breathing crappy air.

The good news  is, provided we don’t further scatter our stuff around LEO, given time and atmospheric drag and a few other factors, orbits will get clean again, but that’s little consolation to the folks who have to live with it (literally) on orbit.  Now we need to find ways to actively clean up LEO.

Late note: according to Nancy Atkinson over at Universe Today, the crew is shutting down hatches on ISS and will head for Soyuz from 16:30 to 16:45 GMT Thursday. The possible debris hit could be in as little as 40 minutes from now (now being around noon on the U.S. East Coast).

Even later note:  the piece passed by and didn’t hit the ISS.  We can all breathe again.