Space debris: evolution in pictures

Between the launch of Sputnik on 4 October 1957 and 1 January 2008, approximately 4600 launches have placed some 6000 satellites into orbit, of which about 400 are travelling beyond geostationary orbit or on interplanetary trajectories.

Today, it is estimated that only 800 satellites are operational - roughly 45 percent of these are both in LEO and GEO. Space debris comprise the ever-increasing amount of inactive space hardware in orbit around the Earth as well as fragments of spacecraft that have broken up, exploded or otherwise become abandoned. About 50 percent of all trackable objects are due to in-orbit explosion events (about 200) or collision events (less than 10).

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HI-RES JPG HI-RES TIFF

Caption:

Distribution of known objects in GEO

Credits:

ESA

ID number:

SEMBNOK26DF

HI-RES JPG size:

1496 kb

HI-RES TIFF size:

10 694 kb

Description

In December 2004 there were 1,124 known objects in the vicinity of the geostationary ring. 31% were controlled satellites, 37% drifted around the earth and 13% oscillated around the stable equilibrium points. There were 153 uncontrolled objects of which no orbit data were available and 60 unidentified objects.

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