LeoLabs, is monitoring a close approach event involving two dead satellites. The birds counterrotating orbits intersect today over Pittsburg, PA, at 5:39 pm Central.

Because the dead birds are in counterrotating orbits and one of the birds, IRAS (Infrared Astronomical Satellite) is very large, with a mass over 1000 kilograms, a head-on impact at a velocity of 14.9 kilometers per second (33,330 mph) would be catastrophic and add thousands of pieces of space debris into low earth orbit.

The concern of a head-on space collision like this is the potential chain reaction as each satellite collision turns two objects into thousands of smaller objects that endanger other satellites we depend on. The more space junk in orbit makes it more difficult to plan future launches and manage birds in orbit.

The issue is many of the now dead or soon to fail birds were launched with no plans to de-orbit after their missions are complete. It’s much more difficult to track the smaller objects and we still don’t have a scaleable solution to collect space debris.

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Blue Moon

With all the junk in orbit, it may not be long before the Earth will look like it has rings like Saturn.

Yikes

This will be interesting.

+1

Yeppers...

Sometimes the big sky theory doesn’t work.

Are there betting odds?

Another Elon Musk business opportunity in the making. $$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Dead Satellite Recovery and Removal LLC

I don't bet but from a statistical standpoint a few days ago it was 1-in-100, as they get closer, last time I checked this morning LeoLabs had the chances at 1-in-1000. They are expecting a near miss with only 13 to 87 meters separation. In space terms, that's very close. The data sets they are using for modeling are very good but not good enough to pinpoint the intersection.

There is apparently no danger for any ground impact. Just a danger to what is in space and what's to come.

For sure. Also LeoLabs (LEO=Low Earth Orbit) is a startup of wicked smart guys that saw the opportunity to monitor what is going on in low earth orbit. SpaceX and all the other companies are keeping them busy and flush with cash.

Heck, lets just send up the space shuttle and have them grab one of them then go after the other one. Oh, we can't since we got out of the shuttle business and depend on others to take care of stuff like this.

Starlink just sent a missile into space this morning saying they are launching 60 internet satellites in space for high speed internet world wide . The weather channel showed the launch this morning . NASA has already said they cannot monitor all the space junk in space now but they do know that even the ISS has been effected in the past and has had some close calls ! The right junk striking the wrong place on the ISS can take the whole Space Station down and kill all aboard .

SpaceX is shooting to have 12,000 Starlink satellites in orbit by the mid to late 2020's. Its going to begin to get a bit crowded up there.

Update - In the last few hours, LeoLabs has increased the probability impact from 1 in 1000, to 1 in 100, and now to 1 in 20 based on new data.

The GSSR decommissioned US spy satellite appears to be on a path that will pass directly above the IRAS satellite. The GSSR passing directly above has an 18 meter boom designed to point down toward earth. It’s unclear if the GSSR is stable or spinning. While LeoLabs still believes it will be a very near miss, if the GSSR is stable with the boom pointing downward, it greatly increases the chances of impact.

Blue Moon

Should the Chicken Littles of the World be worried?

I'm super excited about Starlink. If all goes well by mid summer they will have enough low orbit, low latency satellites to cover the USA. It's going to be a game changer. I posted about this but it may have been on THF. As an amateur astronomer I just hope they don't ruin the night sky for those of us that play with astrophotography.

Zero danger of any ground impact. The danger is to what is up there and what will be up there...

I see a future for space junkers.

I know exactly what you mean since i just retired my amateur astronomy hobby of over 20 yrs . But space is already ruining astrophotography , many amateurs report and post images that have satellites and space junk ruining an image . I had one of M42 and sent it to NASA and they replied telling me it was junk debris from the exploded satellite that belonged to China back a few yrs ago . Now there is a line of satellites that some have imaged that are in a single line coming over like the ISS does only a little more dimmer .

Back in the day...

Blue Moon

Sounds like a job for the Space Force.

Space is super gay

Starlink added new coatings on the recent batch of 60 that were launched today in hopes of helping with the reflective issue. I've been following the issue since the first Starlink launch. They were much brighter than anticipated.

I was really torn when I saw the first images as I've been a big fan of Starlink from a global ISP provider standpoint but I've always planned to build a dedicated observatory so my heart sank when I saw the first images and thought they could actually screw up the night sky. Now I'm waiting to see what happens with both light pollution and satellites.

That said, I'm super excited about the new RASA telescopes. If you haven't been following check them out. You might want to get back into the game if your primary interest was astrophotography.

Blue Moon

Makes you wonder what is going on in that pic with those feet on either side of her.

If I was to write a movie script similar to this, only one of the vehicles was manned, do you think it would fly?

She was pretending Skylab hit her on the head... Very young photographer, feet in pic. I wouldn't make the same mistake today...

Not even a downed satellite would go to Pittsburgh.

LeoLabs via Twitter: Final update prior to close approach: 47 meter predicted miss distance, w/ increased separation in the cross-track direction. Next scheduled radar passes for both objects to occur approximately two hours after the event.

golf clash new tourney?

Able Baker leader, this is Foxtrot One, do you copy?

this would make a good movie plot.

Nothing official as it takes time to process the various radar data but there were clear skies in Pittsburg and no visible impact. Early reports are GGSE is overflying Canada with no deviation in orbit - meaning it's likely just a near miss.

Blue Moon

This thread suddenly has a gold pirate coin feel to it.

Hop, it's ok to come out of your hidey hole now.

What a disappointment.

Was Geraldo Rivera your news source?

Only near Uranus .

are you sure?

We all clear?

Our lights just flickered pretty good. Any coincidence?

Gold bullion!

This went under appreciated. Sure it's a blunt delivery, but solid A-

elcoyote, esq. is a butt pirate.

Here is a cool visualization from LeoLabs that depicts 14,006 objects in Low Earth Orbit. There are over 250,000 pieces of space debris in orbit but only a small fraction is currently being tracked. LeoLabs is trying to solve that problem. They provides space debris tracking and collision prevention services for Low Earth Orbit satellite operators.

Wonder how crowded it is up there? On average a near miss occurs once per day with satellites passing within 100 meters. Most of those have less than a 1 in 1000 chance of collision and are much smaller in size than the large car size IRIS that was at risk in this thread. Possible collisions don’t make the news unless the risk is greater than 1 in 1000. The concern of any collision is the possibility of a cascading event that will take out other satellites and potentially create a unmanageable debris field.

LeoLabs can track tiny cubestats that are only .25U ( 4”x4”x1”) and even smaller debris.

They have ground radar in Alaska, Texas (Midland Space Radar), New Zealand.

The VISUALIZATION on their site is so much better as it's in real time and much smoother. I made this animated gif with some screen captures and it doesn't do it justice. Click the link to play with it. If you double click when you get there it makes it larger and if you grab the earth you can rotate it.

Blue Moon