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- VIENNA (AFP) - Experts warned
Wednesday that a disaster could occur, possibly threatening craft such
as the space shuttle, if nothing is done to clean up huge amounts of space
debris floating around the globe.
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- At a UN conference on the use of space, the experts said
the risk of orbital collision at the moment was tolerable, but insisted
action must be taken to avoid it growing out of control.
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- Up to 100,000 small pieces of debris -- ranging from
pinhead-sized fragments discarded or fallen off rockets to entire redundant
satellites -- are estimated to be in orbit around the planet, they said.
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- Isobe Syuzu, of the National Astonomical Observatory
in Tokyo, said experts predicted in the early 1990s that a so-called "catastrophe
phase" of collision risk, due to ever-increasing amounts of space
debris, could occur about 2010.
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- "That is no longer valid. But certainly that phase
will come if we don't do anything," he told reporters at the Vienna
UNISPACE III conference, adding: "We want to clean it up, but space
is so wide."
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- Czech expert Lubos Perek said the risk of collisions
is "bearable at the moment, but it will grow in time," adding:
"It is like the danger of colliding if you drive from Vienna to another
European capital. You face the risk. Most people accept that risk. The
probability that the next space shuttle will return home intact is fairly
high."
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- So far the only recorded collision in which space debris
caused serious damage occurred some years ago, and knocked a six-metre
(20-feet) boom off of a French satellite.
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- Various methods of dealing with space garbage are under
discussion and development.
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- One such could involve a giant laser sent into orbit
which could evaporate smaller debris, while another possibility would be
a giant device which could magnetically attract small pieces of rubbish.
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- Other options include strengthened shielding on space
craft at risk, and moving redundant satellites and other space equipment
into higher orbits, out of the danger of collision, once they have finished
their active life.
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- One delegate said the key problem was regulatory: enforcing
rules globally on a space industry which is increasingly privatized and
fragmented.
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- Speaking under condition of anonymity, he said this approach
was facing particular opposition from the United States. "They do
not want to have multi-lateral regulations restricting their own interests,"
he said.
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- Perek concluded by noting that the combined weight of
metalwork in orbit above our heads was estimated at 2,500 tonnes. "All
this material poses dangers to active spacecraft," he said.
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- "Let us hope that in the year 2000 this will change,"
he said.
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- The 11-day UNISCPACE III conference, attended by some
3,000 scientists, diplomats and business people, started last week and
is due to conclude on Friday with an overall statement on the use of space.
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- The Vienna space meeting is the first of its kind since
the end of the Cold War. The UN staged two previous conferences in 1968
and 1982.
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