Artist's impression of ClearSpace satellite embracing the VESPA. Image credit: ClearSpace SA
Posted on 11/28/2020 8:56:14 PM PST by dayglored
No, really. It has signed a contract to make this happen in 2025
The European Space Agency has formalised its plan to dispose of space junk by using an orbiting claw to grab an old bit of rocket before dragging both the claw and the junk to a fiery doom.
The agency announced the plan in late 2019 when it revealed it had asked Swiss startup ClearSpace to fully scope the mission.
The paperwork was due in March and found favour with ESA's Ministerial Council, which has approved funding for an €86 million contract to fund the mission.
The goal remains the same: fly ClearSpace's junk-grabbing claw to intercept a VESPA (Vega Secondary Payload Adapter) that has orbited since the 2013 launch of an ESA Vega rocket.
Artist's impression of ClearSpace satellite embracing the VESPA. Image credit: ClearSpace SA
The Adapter weighs 112kg, which, ESA said, is close to the size of a small satellite. Once ClearSpace's claw grabs the lump of junk, they'll got on a hot date to the atmosphere. So hot that neither will survive the experience.
The hope is that even though the pair's short relationship ends badly, it will give humanity the chance to retrieve other unloved orbiting objects before they deal out bad break-ups to things humanity would like to remain in space.
ESA's announcement of the contract says its €86m will only cover some of the mission's cost. ClearSpace gets to raise the rest as it pursues its goal of becoming a space garbage collection business. ®
Somebody find the meme, please....
Define “space junk” and how does this agency have authority to do so.
Isn’t most space junk metal.
Why not use a super magnet?
A super magnet in the shape of a claw would be even better!
I have a simpler design a fraction of the cost.
Probably most space junk is non-ferrous and would not go for a magnet.
Because the metal is aluminum, not ferrous iron.
my first thought was the Craw,
It’s not all junk! There’s a perfectly good Hasselblad Superwide camera with a 38mm Zeiss lens that was dropped by Michael Aldrin in an EVA.
Mark
Much of the metal used in space vehicles is aluminum and magnesium, which is useless with magnets.
Mark
That was Michael Collins!
Mark
All other hopes for reform having been exhausted, a terrestial version needs to be developed for use on the EU bureaucracy. An American model would also facilitate President Trump’s labors in his second term.
A movie ahead of it's time.
I had a giant claw once.
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