space junkSpace junk is millions of man-made debris floating around the earth, creating potential problems and dangers for operating aircraft. The debris consists of tiny blobs of paint, defunct satellites exploding in space, destroyed weather satellites, and debris from the defunct Soviet satellite when it hit the American Iridium satellite over northern Siberia. Humanity's journey into space, which began with the launch of the Soviet satellite Sputnik in 1957, has had a series of launches that have flooded space with lots of inert debris. Launch vehicles built over the years have left behind huge amounts of debris that have left around half a million pieces of junk in space, ranging in size from one to ten centimeters. This junk may seem insignificant in size but it is dangerous in space. The tiny speck of paint packs a punch of a 550-pound object traveling at about 60 miles per hour. These objects can cause serious damage to an aircraft's vital equipment such as solar cells, cables, or can create more debris during impact. Collisions with larger debris can cause more damage and disable a spacecraft, like what happened to the French spacecraft in 1996. Smaller debris can even threaten astronauts during the spacewalk: so, this debris is monitored closely from agencies such as the European Space Operations Centre. (ESOC). A measuring telescope, a radar system and a satellite system are used at sites such as the Canary Islands, in Germany and on ESA's international space planes.Cleaning up outer spaceIn recent years, numerous space organizations have been studying how to clean up space debris that is still in orbit. What is studied are the challenges faced by the organization… middle of paper… space. There are real collisions that occur one to two times a year between active space satellites and space debris. There are random acts of God that sometimes wreak havoc on satellites and no one can do anything about it. Part of the current plans of different world agencies right now is to track space debris and prevent it from colliding with operational satellites. An avalanche of collisions could destroy all the satellites if a cleanup operation is not implemented soon. If a collision were to occur, it would create more debris that could make space uninhabitable for satellites, for hundreds of years. This scenario is a real threat and could be catastrophic if it were to happen. Therefore, accurately tracking materials in orbit and preventing an avalanche of colliding debris can prevent the big problem from becoming even bigger..