Fighting Space Junk: The Next Generation
Lockheed Martin Joins With Tech Company to Build a Space Debris Tracking Station in Australia
Space junk kept us on the edges of our seats in "Gravity." The WSJ's Rob Taylor tells Miguel Gonzalez about two companies teaming up in the Australian Outback to track the real-world space debris.
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CANBERRA, Australia - Space junk has become a real-life worry of the kind depicted in the hit Hollywood movie 'Gravity,' where a storm of debris rips through a spacecraft in orbit and leaves the crew stranded. Now, U.S. defense giant Lockheed Martin Corp.
has joined with a Canberra-based tech company to build a tracking station in the Australian Outback that can follow debris as small as a baseball threatening commercial and government satellites orbiting the Earth. "There are up to 200 threats a day identified for orbiting satellites," said Trevor Thomas, a Lockheed Martin spokesman. "Most satellites can sustain some damage, but little bits of junk hit satellites every day and each, on average, is worth around $500 million." Lockheed and partner Electro Optic Systems Holdings Ltd.
aim to use optical and laser tracking technology first proven on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan to track debris moving at speeds of 17,500 miles an hour. The equipment deployed in Western Australia would be in addition to radar-based systems, such as the U.S. Air Force's Space Fence, which can follow as many as 200,000 objects. ENLARGE
The Cygnus cargo spacecraft makes a delivery to the International Space Station in July as the pair flew over Kenya.
NASA/Associated Press
There are nearly 2,000 satellites in orbit and space junk is a constant and potentially costly worry for their operators. EOS estimates that one satellite is destroyed each year, on average. More than 21,000 pieces of debris with a radius larger than 10 centimeters - similar to a bowling ball - are known to exist in orbit and are routinely tracked by the U.S. Space Surveillance Network. This debris includes tools dropped by spacewalking astronauts and shattered pieces of obsolete rockets that exploded after being left to drift in space. But even the tiniest bits of debris can cause damage. Windows on orbiting space shuttles have had to be replaced on return to Earth after being hit by minuscule flecks of paint traveling at ballistic speeds, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA. The U.S. space agency estimates there could be more than 100 million bits of debris smaller than a fingernail on the move about 500 miles above Earth's surface. Already, there have been several collisions and close calls. In 1996, a French satellite was hit and damaged by debris from a French rocket that had exploded a decade earlier. Five years ago, a defunct Russian satellite collided with and destroyed a commercial satellite owned by U.S.-based Iridium Satellite LLC-adding more than 2,000 pieces of debris to the inventory of space junk, NASA said. The biggest contribution to space junk came in 2007 when China demonstrated its ability to eliminate military threats in space by firing a missile at its Fengyun-1C weather satellite. Instantly, the projectile and the one-ton spacecraft were reduced to roughly 3,000 fragments. ENLARGE
To tackle the problem of orbiting debris, satellite operators and NASA mostly use radar-based sensors on the ground to detect approaching space junk and move astronauts and equipment out of harm's way. On several occasions, astronauts on the International Space Station have sheltered in Soyuz space capsule lifeboats because of the threat of catastrophic collisions. Lockheed Martin and EOS's proposed tracking station aims to first use optical technology to find debris, and then a laser to calculate its distance from Earth and speed of movement. "It's like a giant version of a hand-held laser-ranging system," said Craig Smith, chief executive of space systems at EOS, referring to the devices used by everyone from golfers to soldiers. Construction of the Australian facility is due to start this year and finish in early 2016, though Lockheed Martin and EOS wouldn't say how much is being invested. When operational, the station is expected to boost the industry's ability to monitor space junk by about 25%. Meanwhile, space scientists are continuing to work on new technologies to tackle the debris problem. At a mountaintop research lab on the outskirts of Canberra, EOS is investigating the potential for powerful plasma beams to zap space junk, using the energy to nudge debris out of the way of satellites. Similar technologies using lasers are under development in the U.S. "Space situational awareness is a growing priority for government and commercial organizations around the world," said Rick Ambrose of Lockheed's space systems division. Corrections & Amplifications Electro Optic Systems Holdings Ltd. is based in Canberra, Australia. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that it is based in Sydney. Write to Rob Taylor at  Save Article