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Ever since the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957, the amount of debris in space has been steadily increasing. This includes space stations, communication satellites, and even small CubeSats. Each launch adds to the orbital pile, with rocket parts and paint chips also contributing. Currently, there are over a million objects wider than a centimeter orbiting Earth and at least 130 million millimeter-sized objects, most of which will not deorbit any time soon.

The crowded orbits have led to challenges for the International Space Station and other crewed missions, which often have to shift orbits to avoid collisions. Satellite impacts from debris have already occurred, creating more debris in the process. If we continue with our current launch projects, collisions will eventually become common, triggering a cascade of collisions known as the Kessler cascade. This runaway process will make survival in orbit impossible.

Kessler cascades have been portrayed in works of fiction like the manga Planetes and the movie Gravity. In reality, the cascade will occur gradually. To mitigate this problem, multiple projects are underway. One such project is a collaboration between the European Space Agency (ESA) and Swiss startup ClearSpace.

ClearSpace aims to remove the largest and most dangerous debris by capturing and forcing it to deorbit. While smaller debris will remain a problem, removing the larger chunks is a significant step. The ESA plans to launch a ClearSpace satellite in 2026 as a pilot mission, targeting the capture of the Vega Secondary Payload Adapter (Vespa) upper-stage component, which weighs around 100kg and is approximately 2 meters long.

However, recent observations by the United States 18th Space Defense Squadron show that there are multiple objects orbiting near the adapter that weren’t there before. This new debris was likely caused by the impact of small, untracked debris fragments. Despite this complication, the ClearSpace team believes it can still carry out the pilot mission as scheduled.

The importance of ClearSpace and similar missions cannot be overstated. With collisions becoming more common, finding solutions to the space debris problem is becoming increasingly urgent.

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