Dodging the kind of meteorite strike that forced Russia to plan a space station rescue mission is nearly impossible, yet the greater threat to spacecraft is actually the man-made debris in orbit, experts say.
Russian announced on Wednesday a February mission to the International Space Station to pick up crew members left stranded after a strike damaged the capsule that was to take them home.
That is why, when the space station's large observation window is not in use, it is shuttered with"very, very thick layers of protective materials," he said. There are half a million pieces of debris the size of a marble and 100 million pieces measuring around one millimetre in orbit, the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs said last month.
China created more than 3,500 pieces of large, trackable debris when it shot down one of its weather satellites in 2007, according to NASA. If a larger piece of debris is seen heading towards the ISS, its thrusters move the football pitch-sized space station out of the way. But now"there is a risky period where we cannot get everybody back if there is a major threat," Schmitt said.
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