Pegasus Research Consortium

Quotehttps://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/spacex-launches-hefty-rocket-with-24-satellites/ar-AADo75z?li=BBnbcA1

SpaceX launches hefty rocket with 24 satellites
By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer  2 hrs ago

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — SpaceX launched its heftiest rocket with 24 research satellites Tuesday, a middle-of-the-night rideshare featuring a deep space atomic clock, solar sail, a clean and green rocket fuel testbed, and even human ashes.

It was the third flight of a Falcon Heavy rocket, but the first ordered by the military.

The Defense Department mission, dubbed STP-2 for Space Test Program, is expected to provide data to certify the Falcon Heavy — and reused boosters — for future national security launches. It marked the military's first ride on a recycled rocket.

Both side boosters landed back at Cape Canaveral several minutes after liftoff, just as they did after launching in April. But the new core booster missed an ocean platform, not unexpected for this especially difficult mission, SpaceX noted.

NASA signed up for a spot on the rocket, along with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Air Force Research Laboratory, the Planetary Society and Celestis Inc., which offers memorial flights into space.

An astronaut who flew on NASA's first space station back in the 1970s, Skylab's Bill Pogue, had a bit of his ashes on board, along with more than 150 other deceased people. Pogue died in 2014.

SpaceX said the mission was one of its most challenging launches. The satellites needed to be placed in three different orbits, requiring multiple upper-stage engine firings. It was going to take several hours to release them all.

The Deep Space Atomic Clock by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is a technology demo aimed at self-flying spacecraft. Barely the size of a toaster oven, the clock is meant to help spacecraft navigate by themselves when far from Earth. NASA also was testing a clean and green alternative to toxic rocket and satellite fuel.

The Planetary Society's LightSail crowd-funded spacecraft will attempt to become the first orbiting spacecraft to be propelled solely by sunlight. It's the society's third crack at solar sailing: The first was lost in a Russian rocket failure in 2005, while the second had a successful test flight in 2015.

"Hey @elonmusk et al, thanks for the ride!," tweeted Bill Nye, the society's chief executive officer.

1/5 SLIDES © Provided by The Associated Press
A SpaceX Falcon heavy rocket lifts off from pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., early Tuesday, June 25, 2019. The Falcon rocket has a payload military and scientific research satellites. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

The Air Force Research Laboratory had space weather experiments aboard, while NOAA had six small atmospheric experimental satellites for weather forecasting.

The Falcon Heavy is the most powerful rocket in use today. Each first-stage booster has nine engines, for a total of 27 firing simultaneously at liftoff from NASA's Kennedy Space Center.

The first Falcon Heavy launch was in February 2018. That test flight put SpaceX founder Musk's red Tesla convertible into an orbit stretching past Mars.

and now it's 5011

Quote4 987 satellites
According to UNOOSA, in history a total of 8 378 objects have been launched into space. Currently, 4 994 are still in orbit – although 7 of them are in orbit around celestial bodies other than the Earth; meaning there are 4 987 satellites whizzing around above our heads every single day.Jan 16, 2019
How many satellites orbiting the Earth in 2019? | Pixalytics Ltd
https://www.pixalytics.com/satellites-orbiting-earth-2019/

Quotehttps://astrobob.areavoices.com/2018/04/10/watch-20000-satellites-orbit-earth-in-real-time-simply-amazing/

Watch 20,000 Satellites Orbit Earth In Real Time — Simply Amazing!
Posted on April 10, 2018    astrobob    News   

excerpt
The website uses data from Space-Track.org and uses the satellite.js library to calculate satellite positions. Stuff in Space is a fantastic teaching and learning tool. Not only will you get a feel for how many objects are buzzing around up there but you'll also know where they're at moment to moment. Watch out – it's addicting!

SPACE JUNK IS A HUGE PROBLEM—AND IT'S ONLY GETTING BIGGER (https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/space/reference/space-junk/?cjevent=1f8358766c6911e9805600530a24060f&utm_source=4003003&utm_medium=affiliates&utm_campaign=CJ)

Hundreds of thousands of man-made objects are zipping around our planet—from dead satellites to errant nuts and bolts, putting our working satellites at risk.

BY MAYA WEI-HAAS

In 2009, nearly 500 miles above Siberia, two satellites collided at some 22,300 mph, bursting into a cloud of thousands of pieces of debris. The culprits of this high-speed accident were the inactive Russian satellite Cosmos 2251 and the active U.S.-based communication satellite Iridium 33. Their catastrophic end was the first known time that two satellites collided in space, and a startling reminder of the growing problem of space junk. 

More than 23,000 known man-made fragments larger than about 4 inches, which is a little wider than two golf balls across, zip around our planet. But those are just the pieces large enough to track. An estimated 500,000 pieces between 0.4 inches and 4 inches across join those larger fragments.

Most of that debris sits within 1,250 miles of Earth's surface in what is known as low Earth orbit, home to lots of satellites, such as NASA's Earth Observing System fleet and the International Space Station. And while space is big—so even 23,000 fragments tend to be far from each other—even the tiniest bits of man-made flotsam can be problematic for active earth orbiters because of their breakneck speeds.

Space junk can impact other objects at over 22,300 mph, faster than a speeding bullet. Collisions with those tiny pieces often leave pits and dings in the many satellites, telescopes, and other objects orbiting our planet. In 2006, for example, a tiny piece of space junk collided with the International Space Station, taking a chip out of the heavily reinforced window.

What is all this trash?
Space junk has been amassing since the first human-made satellite, Sputnik 1, escaped Earth's gravitational pull on October 4, 1957. The momentous event heralded the start of the Space Age as humans began to explore ever further away from our home world, a feat that has been repeated in more than 4,700 launches around the globe. But that also means we've left our mark on space in the form of trash.

The junk includes the stages from rockets that jettison satellites into orbit and the satellites themselves once they die. But it also includes smaller bits and pieces lost to space including paint chips that flake away from the outsides of devices, nuts and bolts, garbage bags, a lens cap, screwdriver, and even a spatula.

But the number has increased sharply in recent decades thanks to both the 2009 satellite collision and China's 2007 destruction of the Fengyun-1C weather satellite during an anti-satellite missile test. On March 27, 2019, India announced it also successfully completed an anti-satellite missile test, creating a new cloud of at least 400 pieces of debris, which increased the risk of impacts to the ISS by an estimated 44 percent over a 10-day period. (The ISS can be maneuvered away if it's in danger.)




There are a few positives, however, for that particular cloud of space junk. Unlike China's high-altitude test in 2007, India's missile is thought to have targeted a low-altitude satellite, Microsat-R, which means most of this debris is expected to re-enter Earth's atmosphere over time. Even so, in a town hall following the event, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine called the debris cloud's creation "unacceptable" and added that "when one country does it, then other countries feel like they have to do it as well."




As the skies become increasingly crowded with scientific and commercial orbiters, all nations need to pitch in to quell the growing problem.

How do we know what's up there?
The United States Department of Defense monitors the debris with the Space Surveillance Network. The group is tasked with detecting, tracking, and cataloging the many human-made items swirling around the planet using a global network of telescopes.

Objects about 4 inches across and larger are cataloged and routinely tracked. Objects as small as 0.12 inches can be identified by ground-based radars, allowing scientists to estimate the population with statistics. Estimates for even smaller material come from examination of the divots and pits on returning spacecraft that operated in low altitudes.

Can we stop launching things to space?
While some of the junk will lose altitude over time and burn up in Earth's atmosphere, there's a lot of stuff up there. Even without new launches or major explosions, the space junk already in low Earth orbit is so abundant that it will likely continue to multiply over the centuries as orbiting pieces collide.

Computer simulations of the next 200 years suggest that during that time debris larger than about 8 inches across will increase by 1.5 times. But the smaller particles will increase even more. Junk between 4 inches and 8 inches is expected to multiply 3.2 times and debris less than 4 inches will grow by a factor of 13 to 20. One review of the state of space junk published in Science notes: "In reality, the situation will undoubtedly be worse because spacecraft and their orbital stages will continue to be launched."

We've become increasingly reliant on the growing constellation of satellites up above. Not only are they invaluable for science but we use them for communication, navigation, weather forecasting, and more. So rather than halting future launches, researchers have been investigating an array of methods to both remove and reduce the space junk.

What is being done?
The cadre of concepts in development to control space junk often sound more like science fiction than reality. JAXA, Japan's space agency, is testing an electronic space whip that stretches six football fields long, known as the electrodynamic tether (EDT). The electrified line, nearly 2,300 feet long, is capped with a 44-pound weight. When deployed, it's intended to knock debris out of orbit, sending it to burn up in Earth's atmosphere.

And that is far from the only option. Other proposals include giant magnets, harpoons, and nets to safely whittle down the growing debris cloud. Many nations are tackling the problem from the other side of the equation, ensuring that any future man-made orbiters sent to soar above Earth's surface have an appropriate end-of-life plan to limit the growing cloud of debris that envelops our home planet.

Sources
NASA Orbital Debris Program FAQ
Catalog of Earth Satellite Orbits
NASA presentation: Growth of orbital debris
U.S. Space Surveillance Program
Lost in space: Eight weird pieces of space junk
Science: Risks in space from orbiting debris
Acta Astronautica: Space traffic hazards from orbital debris mitigation strategies
Iridium 33/Cosmos 2251 Collision
NASA visible Earth: Space debris

   Well, with all this trash (and none trash) orbiting about the Earth you watch.  One of these rich civilian space Co. will be starting a "space debris disposal service" SDDS.   I guess the whole world would have to pay for the service somehow.  lol  And if anybody ops out of paying, debris will fall there way!  LOL  Just joking of course.  But it raises a question.
   What is the best way to remove this debris and where to send it?  I would concentrate on using a beam projection system of some kind to disintegrate the target debris.  Or perhaps an accumulator type of approach.  Gathering as many objects as possible and heading for the sun.  However this and anything along the same line will be nearly impossible to achieve with the inherent problems of thrust and load compensation.  So it looks to me like the best way to approach this problem is indeed to essentially shoot this stuff and blow it out of existence.  At least using a laser or particle beam of some kind wont add any more Lbs. of debris to the mix.
   But then particle beam projectors are just fiction right.  ;)  lol  :o
   I wonder what well be done about this.  If something isn't done, it wont be long before sending anything into space will be a ridiculous risk.  Hopefully they wont wait till we loose lives because of a collision.  It's almost happen already!  But we just keep shooting more stuff into orbit.  Some of which contains our peoples.
  Looking the other way while adding to the problem is one of the worst characteristics humanity has.  Just look at the planet and now we're spreading pollution off world ta-boot.  Just think, we will be the only planet going with its own self made rings of garbage.  We'll be known as "The garbage ring world".  Oh my, what will the rest of the universe think of us then?!!!!    :o

Isn't is amazing( I am being sarcastic) that private companies like SpaceX and Virgin Galactic, Bigelow, et al, are developing re-usable boosters, making plans to go to the moon and mars before NASA"s planned dates, even testing inflatable habitat modules on the ISS, yet we can't figure out an easy way to sweep up the mess we made  ::)

Seems I remember an effort by some people we know to address that issue, yet no one much seemed to care...

Seeker

Maybe Saturn is mocking us.  :P