How Much Space Junk Orbits Earth? [Infographic]

By: Earth How · Last Updated: May 17, 2020

Did you know there is over 5500 tons of space junk above Earth’s surface? The majority of space junk is within the 700 to 36,000 kilometer range.

If you’ve seen the academy award-winning film “Gravity”, you’d probably think space is a pretty scary place.

A collision from a Russian rocket launch sparks a chain reaction causing debris to circle every 90 minutes.

Even the International Space Station and Hubble Telescope were part of the wreckage. It’s not entirely implausible. But it’s unlikely because everything is on different orbits.

The space junk problem is a man-made one. Here’s why there’s been a rise in space debris.

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What started the rise of space junk?

Space junk consists of parts that were once used by satellites or rockets that are still floating in orbit that we can’t bring back down to Earth.

There are an estimated 21,000 objects >10 cm and 500,000 objects

CHINA ANTI-SATELLITE MISSION: In 2007, China launched a ballistic missile which collided with a weather and reconnaissance sattelite.

IRIDIUM-33 AND COSMOS-2251: An accidental collision between Iridium33 and Cosmos 2251 flung around debris in low Earth orbit.

Space junk is another problem that has arisen over the years and has gotten worse. But first, let’s define what it actually means.

Who watches satellites and space junk?

There are approximately 1000 operational satellites in orbit and this number has been steadily increasing over the years. One reason they don’t collide with each other is that they are continually being monitored by the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD).

They keep a database of all known rocket launches and each orbit. If there was a critical type of scenario, satellites do have mini jet thrusters to move them around in orbit.

In the case of onset collision, these thrusters can be used for safety. But these thrusters are also used for repositioning themselves in orbit to improve their own functionality.

So what are the triggers that could cause space debris? Here are three:

Satellites colliding with other geostationary or non-geostationary satellites,
Space debris or dead satellites stunning another satellite, or
Asteroids or micro meteorites hitting satellites are hard to predict. That’s why NASA’s Near Earth Object Program keeps a close eye on asteroids.