Can Space Junk Kill you? | Earth Science

With all the debris floating around in space, what are the chances of it killing one of us, or all of us? Dominic Burgess has the answers.

Foot notes:

[carlwitt]

Turn and punch, don't think, just turn and punch.

truer words have never been spoken.

[ballfun]

NASA budget so cheap they don't even pay a litter fee

[Joemame]

Imagine just sitting in your garden and then you see a wall of fire and debris heading towards you, I would shit my pants

[HuMaNiTaRiAn]

Okay Earth lab, you're off to a good start.

[JPMitchell]

This makes me think of Dead Like Me, where the main character is killed by a toilet seat from space.

[JoshuaPDX]

The answer is Space Lottery. Sell tickets, set up a massive numbered grid somewhere remote, and give the debris a nudge. Earths orbit is now cleaner and the clean up will be essentially crowd funded. Your Welcome Space Agencies!

[dadecoza]

So you're telling me there's a chance?

[solarisfire]

Last time someone tapped me on the shoulder and I turned and punched it was a police officer...

Don't do it, it's not clever...

[huwmm]

Only if I'd have known that it was my boss tapping my

[tiki_trash]

Chuck Norris turned and punched that space junk right back into orbit!

[my_dear_friend_]

What about the accumulated orbiting space junk making it unsafe or impossible to leave our planet?

[yantantetherer]

I just planted a coconut tree. It's about a foot high.

[Saheb_Banik]

Thanks for the suggestion, mate.
I was watching your video in my classroom. My physics professor tapped my back and I did what you said. I turned and punched. Now I am rusticated. 🙂

[davidwuhrer]

I liked the reference to the coconut lethality reference metric. Improbable research, but ignoble in some circles, enough so to prize.

[R]

You know how to deal with space junk, don't you kids? Just say "NO!".

[andymcl]

"At 20 times the speed of sound." Remind me, what's the speed of sound in space? Oh yeh, zero :p

[iloveg]

It will be the new way of being killed by lightning!

[donaldhobson]

put a sheet of mylar in orbit in the wrong direction.

[sarahepearce]

maybe create a gyre like in the ocean to get all the space junk together and then drop it all at once. might be too dangerous?

[BrumeNoire]

Note to self : wear protective goggles when looking at the sky