Quote Originally Posted by DevilHorse View Post
We've touched on the subject of light pollution from the many satellites from the Elon Musk Starlink venture.

Many of you have no doubt also seen the movie Gravity with Sandra Bullock, where a collision in space creates a huge amount of space debris that causes a huge calamity for an astronaut crew.

Well yesterday that narrative appeared to be happening for real.
https://www.space.com/space-debris-a...-november-2021
The russians were apparently testing an Anti-Satellite (ASAT) space weapon and attempted to shoot down one of their own satellites. Of course, these things don't get destroyed in a lump and fall to earth; they become a large debris field that orbits the earth in a thousand small, fast moving shards.

The 7 astronauts on the International Space Station had to take cover as it moved through the debris field. But it will not be a one time event unless the ISS is moved to a different orbit to avoid this (now) 'permanent' debris field.

Larry
DevilHorse
I thought the entertaining movie, Gravity, broke the laws of physics. Projective-velocity debris was endangering Bullock and Co. every 90 minutes. I mean -- really? If debris field going much faster than the satellite/space ship in orbit, then that stuff would move to an outer orbit -- or leave Earth's gravitational field entirely. Or, maybe I got less from Physics 125 than I thought.