The Space Graveyard and Second Moon



We are hearing hundreds of space shuttle launches every year of which some become failures and as most are using non-reusable spacecraft there will be debris everywhere. Have you wondered where all these are getting dumped?

The Point Nemo and its distance from the nearest landmass

There is a place known as spacecraft cemetery, which lies the east of New Zealand in the southern pacific ocean. It is known formally as the South Pacific Ocean Uninhabited Area. The area is central to Point Nemo the location furthest from any land. This isolated spot in the ocean is technically called the Oceanic Pole of Inaccessibility. The cemetery has a total of more than 250 spacecraft resting there. The largest one being the Russian space station MIR or what's left of it. We have seen news that the ISS has increased its orbit due to debris of satellites. Just imagine, The International Space Station which is about the size of a football field crashing down on over your head. This is avoided with the help of this odd place. 

MIR Russian Space Station

Other spacecraft in the graveyard range from rocket's secondary payloads to spy satellites, small Russian space stations, fuel tanks, and hundreds of cargo ships that carried supplies to astronauts in orbit. Russia is the main contributor to the cemetery followed by the USA. The descent to the graveyard itself is a humongous task. At first, the spacecraft is brought into the so-called orbital decay or spacecraft death before crashing to the waters. The ISS will also taste Nemo's water in coming years. 

The European Space Agency craft Jules Verne during re-entry before landing on point Nemo.
credit: NASA 

Don't think that the whole spacecraft will be there, in the process of descending due to friction the spacecraft gets heated up and is broken into pieces and the leftovers are crash-landed there. The satellites we send into farther orbits are sent to a special orbit called graveyard orbits which is 22,400 miles above the earth!

The so-called second moon 2020 SO was space garbage. It was a booster launched by NASA as part of American Surveyor Moon Missions in the 1960s. Initially, researchers thought it was an asteroid later discovered that there was steel on it. The booster has been orbiting the sun in earth's similar orbit which led to the conclusion that it was sent from earth. The minimoon will be leaving us by March 2021.


The orbit of the second moon around the earth.
Credit NASA



Well as per the growth of space technology, we will have to arrange “Space garbage trucks” to clear these satellites and remains of space debris, so that it won't pose threat to human exploration.

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