Space Debris

Key PointsMelburnians noticed a mysterious ball of light shoot across the city's sky on Monday.The Australian Space Agency investigated the phenomenon, after residents suggested it could be a meteor.The agency has since confirmed it was likely the remnants of a Russian Soyuz-2 rocket re-entering the atmosphere.The Australian Space Agency has…

Man-made debris and naturally occurring micrometeoroids orbit in and around Earth's space environment at high speeds. Credit: NASA WASHINGTON — The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity selected four vendors to develop technologies and new approaches for tracking small debris objects in space. A-Tech, Advanced Space, SRI International, and West Virginia…

The mystery of a huge piece of "space junk" that washed up on a beach in Western Australia may have finally been solved. The Australian Space Agency first issued a statement about the cylindrical metal debris on July 17. On Monday (July 31), the agency said that the mysterious wreckage…

Knowing that all of humanity's ecosystems are inextricably linked, including our space environment, I became the world’s first space environmentalist a decade ago, advocating for a broader definition of environment that extends beyond the atmosphere. There are approximately 30,000 pieces of tracked debris now zipping through space at upward of…

In 1962, President John F. Kennedy gave one of his most historic speeches as he catapulted the U.S. into the space race against Russia. His words still hold immense passion and foresight today: “We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained and new…

Terms like “cultural heritage” and “archaeology” might conjure Indiana Jones-lie scenes of old and ancient things buried under the sands of time. But even now, each one of us is producing material that could interest future humans trying to record and study our own era. For those who believe that…

More pieces were found over the following weeks to months, including much further away, out to Tumbarumba on Jordan Hobbs' property. It thrust the discussion of space junk into the spotlight here. How we manage objects in space, what we do to dispose of them, and how we prevent space…

Space The Hubble Space Telescope has snapped the results of smashing a spacecraft into the asteroid Dimorphous By Alex Wilkins The asteroid Dimorphous, three months after it was hit by a spacecraft NASA, ESA, David Jewitt (UCLA), and Alyssa Pagan (STScI) Last year, NASA smashed a spacecraft into the asteroid…

A dome-shaped mysterious object that has washed up on a remote Australian beach is “most likely a solid rocket motor casing”, the country’s space agency said on Wednesday, as police in Western Australia removed the “space debris" to a secure location. The canister was discovered near the beach in Green…

A large metal object that washed up on a beach in Western Australia is believed to be space junk. The car-sized lump appeared on a beach about 155 miles (250 kilometers) north of Perth, Western Australia, several days ago, and has received growing attention ever since. Commenting on the unusual…