A year ago, I wrote about China’s ill-advised space weapons test. When China complained about the US government’s successful takedown of a dead satellite last week, I have to shake my head and wonder. There’s a big difference. A year ago, China conducted an unannounced test of a weapons system that left thousands of debris chunks remain in orbit, as this January 2008 article from Wired shows. DailyWireless has more pictures and additional discussion.
This month, the US government announced its plan well in advance, and it wasn’t a weapons test.
As Jeffrey Lewis pointed out on Wired and ArmsControlWonk, some debris may remain in orbit. The official line, as reported in the New York Times and Honolulu Advertiser, is that the satellite was destroyed.
Writers such as Lewis and Farhad Manjoo don’t live in Hawaii, and may lack the personal stake that I and my fellow residents have in this story. It is much easier to hit a tumbling satellite than an inbound missile. I’m glad the US military can hit both, because Honolulu is a prime target.
But I’d much rather see international efforts to remove space junk from orbit, before an errant bolt or paint chip takes out a communications satellite or a manned mission.
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