The anime Planetes was the first story I saw set in such a future where the Kessler syndrome was an active risk that constantly had to be worked against. (It was a manga first, either follows the day to day of a group of space debris "cleaners", but also tackles bigger stories including geopolitical issues)
@@billos3218 I hope it'll be enjoyable, it's kind of very dated in some ways by now - for instance the lack of heavy use of drones and similar automation.
Started watching it, I really like it! The slice of life type thing isn't something I have much experience with but it makes a refreshing change to all the anime with giant mecha fighting suits and overt Dark Lords scheming on world domination. All in all, I'm really glad I gave it a look and I plan on binging most of it soon.
With a laser sweeper, we would want to target the leading edge of debris bits, not the top. Thrusting perpendicular to the path of motion doesn't reduce the overall inertia, and is more likely to increase it if imprecise. Pushing it downward, straight toward the Nadir point, would just shift the phase of the orbit, and only nudge the actual altitude of the periapsis a tiny amount lower. What you need is a retrograde push. Slowing down along the path of motion is the fastest and cheapest way to drop the periapsis. This is a feature of orbital mechanics related to inertial momentum and conservation of energy.
Incidentally, I have over 10000 hours in KSP.. I've put enough stuff into orbit to cause Kessler Syndrome, if the game didn't have a maximum debris setting. Lol
@@graphite7473 It’s said that you need 10,000 hours of,practice to become an expert at something You are now an expert at KSP, your degree is in the mail
@Wesley Adams it’s not the lasers themselves that cause the push, the lasers are just to heat up a small section, and that superheated section vaporizes into gas That gas acts like a small thruster as it escapes out into the vacuum of space
I like the idea of using various forms of Kesslerization as another form of stellar terrain for planets in stories. The sand-blaster bit explains a lot of the wear and tear on things like StarWars ships where planets have been in use for thousands of years; and it's also easy to imagine a story where the clearsky window presents a time pressure. Simple example, imagine a mining world where the bots have gone mad, or the aliens have gotten free - or even more likely a miner's revolution cuts a bloody swath through the regular corpo indentures. The heros want to get off-world, but a disaster years ago left a Kessler cloud above that has had a narrow cooridoor blown in it. They must make the window in a matter of hours, or else be trapped on the world as the (THING) approaches.
You know one thought about the laser broom on regards to the "too small to track" debris: If we had a functioning laser broom we could just have a very long course sweeping sector pattern such that over the course of X years or X months, the totality of low earth orbit got Beamed. Could probably push the sandpaper effect back to a small limit
Another idea: we could use fire to fight fire. We could launch large quantities of sand into low orbit to sand-blast big chunks (from the occasional satellite down to finger-sized bits). The goal is to ablate debris down into more "sand" rather than breakin gthem in two Asteroids-style, but given time, either would work. After some time, one would end up with mostly "sand" and at that point, we could launch finer and finer dust to ablate the sand further. Fine dust would deorbit far sooner than sand, and sooner by orders of magnitude than big debris, so the dust would be self-clearing in a much shorter timeframe. Since we'd want as much collision efficiency as possible, sand and dust would be launched in counter-orbit (against planetary rotation rather than with it) and would therefore require dedicated launch facilities if you want to use mass drivers. And of course, all components have to be either fine-grained, or prone to shatter into very fine debris. I'd think that some "frangible rounds" can provide a good starting point for a working design that counteracts Kessler syndrome instead of prolonging it, not sure if it works in that energy regime, tho. In comparison, clearing Kessler syndrome from "outside" (from the moon or another planet) is almost trivial, since you can use large scale solar energy, lower launch costs, etc. And that doesn't even cover the case where a 1000-planet federation joins forces to help a single-planet polity.
This could be used as a form of interplanetary warfare designed to contain them and remove them as a potential threat rather than completely obliterating them. Just feed trillions of ball bearings in low, medium and high orbit and then just occasionally feed high orbit with more as they all slowly orbit lower and lower.
Coat them with something that doesn't reflect radar and make them ablate on contact leaving as little trace as possible. Then sit back and watch as their first early rockets get shredded just above the atmosphere and they develop a religion centred around their belief that their god simply does not wish them to leave their planet.
Just 1 tera ton conglomerate asteroid shoved into an intersecting low orbit and blown up or a magnetic accelerator in a asteroid belt pumping a stream of 1 to 100 ton lots of tailings in to their planets orbital intersection.
I actually read an ongoing reddit series where exactly that happened. It's called the nature of predators if you're interested. It's around the chapter 125-129 mark.
I have pictured in my head a civilization that can turn the disadvantage of being a natural Kessler planet into an advantage. Find a clever way to harvest all that debris and using it to setup space infrastructure while staying close to home.
Interesting idea. Would it be a natural KS. Such as a ring, or space debris caused by asteroids and meteors? Or an artificial KS where an ancient advanced civilization once existed and a primitive/resurgent civilization on world discovers space flight and are currently trying to look through the junk to advance themselves?
@@emmanuelstamatakis8218 ahem, I assume you meant "cosmic" Material? Although, maybe it can be cosmetic; a cyberpunk "cobblestone" look for our orbiting stations? Maybe brick satellites? A new meaning for "built like a brick $hithouse"?
Latching onto that idea a bit, I wonder what the native ecology of such a planet might look like. In my head I'm envisioning the surface of this world cover in clouds of grit and dirt. Imagine species that've evolved to get some of their vital nutrients and intake through breathing, like filter feeders. Pure atmosphic environments might be detrimental or outright poisonous to such beings. It might be a world where "pollution" is viewed as a postive byproduct of industrialization, as it makes the air easier to breath or reduces hunger. I"m gonna find a way to use this st some point.
"You definitely want to have the means to stop it right as it begins" If I know anything about disease spread, it's that someone will find a way to avoid doing that if it costs money.
if its anything like how the last 20 years led up to covid, it will be more a case of "sell off and sabotage anything that could be done to control it, while putting their friends in positions to profit from the crisis when it happens." even if just in relation to the majority.
I wonder about the idea of using collision cascades like this as a means for a space-faring faction to blockade a planet and keep those on it planet-bound. I love the Mobile Suit Gundam franchise, but I've always thought the Principality of Zeon should have just detonated an O'Neil cylinder in orbit, rather than crashing it into the surface of the Earth.
@@GreenBlueWalkthrough I'd considered that, but given how the Side 4 shoal zone is considered too dangerous to navigate (except when it's not for plot reasons), I figure Kessler Syndrome would just be the same thing in low Earth orbit.
Kessler syndrome is a realistic way to siege/blockade a planet, through numbers alone. It takes some time to clear up the debris, so the aggressors can be sure that their target cannot instantly recover from it even if an adequate technology exists, and that the blockade cannot be simply broken from a 3rd party, through physics alone. The besieger may also always threaten to drop clusters of debris to devastating effect, though it can't be particularly accurate, but it might serve as a demoralizing deterrent to any type of prolonged hesitation to ultimatum (i.e. a medieval catapult/trebuchet effect).
I guess the writers haven’t really thought about it because I’d reckon that they probably would have completely trashed the orbits by the time after CCA at the latest
I wish there was a series with a near future James Bond style hero who fought villains who always tried to conquer Earth using ideas exclusively inspired from this channel.
While I can see some kessler syndrome scenarios as being possible: I think it is also ultimately quite avoidable via basic cleanup. Almost ALL of our LEO satellites are basically data gathering/processing instrumentation. I can envision a couple dozen practical and (currently) achievable approaches to mitigating or rapidly cleaning up LEO if this were to occur. Indeed many approaches don't even involve deorbiting into atmosphere for burnup, but instead for recycling in-orbit with orbital processing/manufacturing facilities to save on costs.
I mean .......... Look at how well we clean up earth tho :/ I could 100 percent see a company weighing the cleanup costs vs the fines and paying the "CC heater" option
@@paulhall9713 "Humanity has launched about 12,170 satellites since the dawn of the space age in 1957, according to the European Space Agency (ESA), and 7,630 of them remain in orbit today - but only about 4,700 are still operational." around 40% and rapidly rising
I like the powdered sugar dekessler. Shoot many tonnes of icing sugar into a retrograde orbit. When it impacts an object it makes a small conical crater and vaporises at the bottom. That imparts its momentum to the object, but the vapour, expanding out of the crater adds even more momentum. The effect is almost nothing on large intact sats. Small debris (paint flakes, spalling products etc) would be given a good kick, enough to deorbit them, if not immediately, then low enough that they'll deorbit from atmospheric drag quite quickly. The sugar itself will deorbit quite promptly as each particle is low mass and high drag. So the sugar clears away naturally after doing its job.
I hadn't heard of this one! It's quite brilliant. Although, you would have to shoot it in all directions, not all satellites orbit eastward on the equator.
@@Greenicegod credit to Casey Handmer. Not my idea. Polar might be harder, but it's a smaller problem. Continued collisions with retrograde equitorial sugar would push polar debris into a retrograde equitorial orbit. From there it could deorbit through collisions with remaining prograde debris or have a special prograde sugar mission.
Sweet! This also comes with the added benefit of creating a layer of cotton candy on the trailing edges of spacecraft that astronauts can harvest during their spacewalks - a rare treat to enjoy while in orbit. :))
I would say to people "we still can go to space with all the debris after the cascade; we'll just have to launch a tank". Liked the tank armor analogy to be mentioned.
I agree. Orbital collision cascade is a much better term. It describes what it is about to start. And is the term I have been using. (Or sometimes I shorten it to collision cascade. Less descriptive, but still understandable if you have given the right context.)
The solution I favour involves huge sheets or blocks of aerogel, with a thin flexible skin to contain shrapnel. In effect, giant gym mats. This requires large scale production of aerogel in space, but this has many other uses (heat shields, insulation etc) and microgravity may even help the process of consistently making large pieces, which is the only thing holding up the widespread use of it on Earth.
Kessler syndrome would disrupt satellite communications, but global communications in general use more than satellites. The world is connected by fiber optic cables that run along the sea floor, AKA the internet. Countries would have minimal problems keeping up real time communications without satellites.
Now that you mention your speech impediment I've only been watching the channel for about a year-and-a-half. And I've gone through a lot of the backlog and it's crazy how much it's improved since when I first started watching and now and even more so when you think about when you started to now.
BTW Satellite perturbations by solar effects, earth gravitational harmonics, atmospheric drag effects from day and night sides, and geomagnetic field all tend to INCREASE the satellite orbital speed and precess the line of nodes. It is counter-intuitive. Adding mass to them slows them down.
I can't wait for the weekend now. I've been thinking about high gravity worlds for awhile and have always wanted to know the limits of chemical rockets on high g planets, without having to do the math.
Do you remember the Gravititron carnival ride? It was my favorite. I didn't know at the time but it was basically a very very small Dyson Ring with very very high gravity. ...for a given value of "basically".
@@TheArtofFugue yeah I kinda worded that poorly, partly for brevity, but the truth is I only generally think of this kinda stuff when driving, bad time for math, not sure why... just got out of the car to make this response.
@@mnemnoth I wish they'd make one with just a flat floor on the rim so you could try to move around. If I ever get rich I might have to buy one to customize. ...I could start a work-out trend. "Bulk up fast with increased gravity!"
Just to tell you your voice/speach lesons are worth your effort. I transitioned from a professional book reader to you and had to turn down my headphones as your deep clear voice was overwhelming at the volume i had previously been required to be listening before.
It’s intriguing to note that ASATs offer a “conventional deference.” Because of how important satellites are in a modern economy ASATs allow a military to have such a high level of firepower to make any war against such a military “not worth the destruction caused by such a war.” It is very advantageous for a nation to develop ASATs if they can’t get nukes.
I heard somewhere (I forget where) that one method to deorbit space debris is to send a suborbital rocket to release a cloud of icing sugar (yes, apparently this is the best material) to intersect with the apogee of the debris. The particles are small enough not to cause further break-up of the debris, but the momentum exchange is enough to drop the perigee into the atmosphere leading to rapid orbital decay. The interceptor rocket and sugar cloud meanwhile drop harmlessly straight back and burn up. Energy required to launch to a suborbital intersect is vastly less than to orbit. Using a returnable first stage it would be possible to cost-effectively launch tens or possibly hundreds of small expendable 2nd stages with sugar payloads to bring down the most dangerous parts of a debris cloud in a single mission.
Kessler syndrome refers to a manmade phenomenon. The chaotic state of space rocks is beyond human control. Saturn's rings are an example of gravitational equilibrium following a chaotic space rock event.
With the mention of Jerry's Stories at the end I would like to mention that the sample he read on his YT channel is fantastic. A gem of a story and YT channel. An informative video as always Isaac.
In the Skyward books by Brandon Sanderson, the planet Detritus (where the book is based) has a shell of debris around it that seemingly keeps the belligerent aliens out. The humans live underground as debris is constantly falling to the surface.
Starting a project on space debris mitigation but these possibilities are scary, though I'd guess if you got multiple planets with orbits industrialised you'd got a big enough drip pan.
What about capturing a comet, putting it in a ball-of-string orbit, and using it both as a gravity tug, and source of gas, to perturb the orbits of debris in orbit?
If I haven't said it before you're doing very well with your speech therapy I can hardly even tell that you used to struggle with your R's and to be honest I really can't say I thought you ever had a speech impediment going back to the first videos you've posted I can say you have concord it bro great job! And keep up the excellent work on these awesome videos!
This makes me wonder if you watched the new movie MoonFall. Absolutely amazing. Has a lot to do with megastructures, trapping stars, Kessler syndrome etc. absolutely amazing movie
There are places over ocean where the damage from EMP of in space nuclear detonation would be trivial. Since everything is moving you could usefully nuke the same place repeatedly.
That's one way to supercharge both the Kessler syndrome AND fill the Van Allen belts with magnitudes more ionizing radiation than it currently is, and make damn well sure that humanity never leaves the planet 😂
why not build several habitable sensor platforms, in different orbits, to replace all the thousands of single use satellites? Governments and companies could buy subscriptions for the data these manned sensor platforms collect, rather than have to pay for their own satellite development, launch and maintenance. Upgrading technology on the platforms would be much simpler than putting up hundreds of new satellites. Collecting all the old satellites and debris would be a lot easier if it were all considered debris. I suggest really large balls of Aerogel, or something like it, that would absorb the momentum of tiny orbital projectiles, adding mass to the Aerogel until it finally slowed enough to fall into the atmosphere by itself. Even if projectiles go completely through the Aerogel, they would have slowed enough to fall. Perhaps there's a way to remotely attach Cubesats on the remaining single use satellites, so the Cubesats could increase their mass enough to change their orbit and/or reduce their velocity with orbital entry burns. This could definitely make a difference.
Hitting larger debris with blocks of ice would redirect the large object and the vaporized ice would temporarily thicken the atmosphere slowing small debris. Super guns firing water into space would quicken the clearing of debris.
I've been thinking about civilizations that may be trapped on their home worlds lately. Besides satellites, what if radiation belts killed whatever tried to cross them?
Now I say you could have regional Kessler syndromes, say geo or low orbit. One option for earth observation satellites and probably gps would be to go high as in well outside geo as pointed out in the video. Now something in GEO would be very bad as stuff here does not decay because of drag.
As sad as I am hearing the ISS will be deorbited into the Pacific Ocean, I am happy there is no possibility something will crash into it and contribute to the Kessler effect further.
You mentioned having a speech impediment at the end... I could barely hear it at all. Even when I tried. Someone has been putting some work in! I for one, am impressed. That isn't easy to do. Kudos!
SFIA: COME FOR THE SCIENCE... STAY FOR THE VOICE ❤ (Favorite voice on RUclips. This man needs an award, funny that he brings up his speech impediment on this episode lol. I listen to this channel every single day, EASY BEST VOICE ON RUclips)
There's a discussion of the hazards inside microgravity shipyards in the online comic Freefall. Florence Ambrose (a non-human gravitational engineer) mentions that these are normally enclosed to minimize the loss of high-value mass in the forms of refined materials, but the downside of that is that in some such docks, particularly the older ones, your work time isn't limited by your suit's oxygen supply, but by how long your vision plate stays transparent. (Although my favorite thing she said about ship repair and maintenance was the while any plumber could fix the plumbing on her ship, she was going to try to get a nuclear qualified structural mechanic because they charge less per hour.)
What would be cool is Kessler cannons. Say an enemy fleet is in orbit, and you want to make life difficult for them. Have lots of tunnels filled with high melting temperature future debris, and use nukes to blast it into space like the gunpowder of a cannon.
i came up with an idea for a powerful (if possibly unfeasible) the kessler railgun: a massive railgun loaded up with trash and scrap metal, infrastructure
Orbital mirrors could also pull double duty. By using curved mirror to have a focal point in low orbit they could be used to push/heat debris while also spreading back to safe levels the light collected past the focal point. Unlikely to hit anything, but free is free.
In the movie Gravity China sacrificy their Tianong space station to prevent it from contribute to the Kessler effect. I can see that as a valid way to minimize a kessler effect by deliberately mass deorbiting satellites that otherwise risk contribute to worsen the problem. This would create a boost to the satellite marked one the orbits have been cleared up.
That was more to make the Chinese look like the "good guys". The space station was small enough to alter it's altitude the few dozen meters required to avoid that movies debris field, which itself was vastly exaggerated.
@@palladin9479 as much as Hollywood sci-fi movies sacrifice realism for drama, Chinese sci-fi movies do even more. I'm assuming it's Chinese, "Gravity China film" results in zero relevant results in DDG searches.
Well now I just feel stupid for bragging to everyone that Sharks are older than rings of Saturn. It sounded too good to be true, should have known better
my orbital mechanics was learned entirely from Kerbal Space Program. I have 5000 hours in that game. You ever need anyone to fly a space ship at the drop of a hat just call me.
It's interesting to hear about what Kessler Syndrome is. It makes me wonder if the character Kessler from Infamous was given this name as he saw the debris of the past preventing us from reaching our future.
If you ask "could a technological species be stuck planetbound because of X" the answer is no. There are plenty of things that would stop us getting to space with current tech. But we are still using the simplest and crudest of space travel tech. Another 100 years of tech progress on earth, and nothing short of a black holes event horizon will keep us down.
Great episode. Kessler Syndrome reminds me of those 'bullet hell' space shooters, but with much angrier physics. I could imagine future satellites coming equipped with laser blasters to help punch through the more difficult orbital bands on launch.
Wouldn’t a Kessler syndrome form (rather quickly) a band of debris rather than a sphere? Wouldn’t that leave two polar regions with a good clear access to set up an infrastructure?
The equatorial bulge of Earth isn't as pronounced as Saturn's, so it wouldn't form a flat disk over the equator, but yes it would tend to form a band probably similar in shape to the Van Allen belts. Every particle that isn't moving in a roughly circular orbit eastward would increase its chance of a collision. Now here's a thought. If there were sufficiently heavy GEO satellites or a ring, they would help pull all debris into the equatorial plane where it could be mopped up more easily. It would have the same effect on the Van Allen belts too.
@@MattOGormanSmith Actually it would form a pretty narrow ring pretty quickly. If the debris is so bad that objects can't safely travel through it, then nothing can persist very long in LEO unless nearly all the remaining debris has the same low inclination.
I think it won't be a big issue once we actually start working in space. Recycling will be the solution if there cost of recycling the material in space is less than the cost to get it into space.
Could Aerogel be used as armor for ships/satelites? Its quite strong and also very light. Presumably this means you could get a lot of it (or base materials to make it) up per launch. And then cover whatver you want in a thick layer.
@@trevorle7382 Currently all human inhabited spacecraft and satelites have some form of armor to protect against small debris. Usually done through a sacrificial outer layer. The debris begins to vaporise on impact and said vapor is less likely to penetrate the inner layers. It has been time for armor since humans made it to space.
@@capturedflame but it’s not strong enough. Like Issac always said, nothing can rival dumb matter. Strength comes with weight. Aerogel is light, meaning not dense, meaning not great armor. It only takes 1980s weapons to make aerogel useless. The best armor we have right now includes steel-cheap and strong, titanium- lighter than steel(not stronger), plastic :v but again, should be used with steel, ceramic materials-which are not that lightweight, and lastly, URANIUM238 - which is undoubtedly heavy. Only the US afford to use Uranium on their tanks So in space, railgun round will punch through almost any reasonable amount of Aerogel used as armor, and put a hole in the steel hull behind it
@@morgankooman yes, that comment of mine was not literal, but more like exaggerated and sarcastic. The thing is that’s not meant to act as armor in space combat. Even in navies, armors have been forfeit for it’s helplessness to defend against modern weaponry. Ultra-lightweight materials like aerogel that he proposed are too weak, and even if it wasn’t, they must be used in larger quantities, making us a big target for debris to wear down over time (Oh and aerogel is insulative, so we’ll have to work on waste heat radiators more)
Could you start a chain reaction that would encourage debris to collect itself into larger groups, or into “lanes”? Making it easier to catalogue and remove?
It might be fun to put up a big ball of gel in front of a particular piece of debris and see if the resulting inelastic collision could send the ball over in front of another piece, and play pinball all the way down.
I think a good general practice for all LEO satellites is to have an Electrodynamic Tether on board. Basically it's a long conducting wire that that experiences drag as it moves through earth's magnetic field. This electrodynamic drag deorbits the craft way faster than just atmospheric drag. It would be used as a fail-safe option for dead craft. No sign of life for 24 hours? Ruelease the tether. As a bonus, the tether produces a current, so there's an additional chance to recover the craft if it experienced a non-permanent power failure. Fans of Neil Stephenson might recognize this technology from Seveneves, known therein as a Lamprey.
I reject the notion that Kessler syndrome would make LEO impassible. If the collision cascade ever reached a point where any ship attempting to pass through was quickly destroyed that would mean the debris itself would be subject to frequent collisions. And with each collision the objects fragment into a large number of much smaller pieces. And many of those pieces would be on orbits with sufficiently low perigees that they would quickly reenter. Kessler syndrome would probably destroy all of our current satellites and might result in a ring of very fine debris over the equator, but it wouldn't form an impassable barrier.
If we had a Bunch of O-Neil cylinders orbiting the Earth what would stop a rogue individual from flying theirs into another causing Kessler syndrome or even worst would they be able to fly it directly into the earth at a major city or would it completely burn up in the atmosphere? I assume we’d have some sort of defensive system around Earth once we get to that point.
One would probably hope that by the time we got to that point, we (as a species) would have evolved to the point where we cared enough about other members of our species that something like you are suggesting would be unthinkable/unconciounable. Also, I would severly hope that with something as large as an O'neill cylinder, control for altering course would not be in the full control of a single person and "defenses" would not be needed. Sorry to say, but even one person asking a question like yours just goes to show that the cultures and societies we have formed as a species are not ready to venture out past our little corner of space yet. IMHO anyway.
@@ravencrovax mental illnesses exist now and, barring a genius neuroscience breakthrough, will exist in the future too. Not that all with mental illness would do such a thing but still, all it takes is one truly insane individual and some bad luck. @cxxx the best defence for this is time, most likely any orbital infrastructure is going to be hours away from each other, if not more. If someone does try to crash an o'neil cylinder, people will notice and probably break that guys arms.
O neil cylinders are very large and would require a lot of energy to move so if one goes rogue then the others are likely going to be able to avoid it.
@@ravencrovax I would hope no one commits such an act either but in a population of trillions it probably wouldn’t be hard to find a group willing to do It therefore defense systems will probably be necessary. I disagree that having precautions means we aren’t ready for space expansion, but I hope you’d be right
A hypothetical planet called Rouch that's about earth size but locked in orbit with a larger body so that the near side has significantly less apparent gravity. I suspect it couldn't really exist as a habitable place but it makes an interesting setting for a story of aliens reaching space early on with low technology just because it's a relatively easy thing once they've made the trip to the near side.
To have such a system where one planet would counteract a significant amount of the gravity of the other, the orbiting planets would need to be so close together that they'd be almost inside the roche limit, where gravity will start to rip apart both celestial bodies.
What i find most concerning about Kessler Syndrome is the potential nuclear war that it could entail. Since SSBMs are not constantly able to contact their respective governments, if a commander of such a vessel has a reason to assume that a nuclear war destroyed said government, they have authorization to initiate an attack on their own. The scary thing about this is that such communication would be satellite based.
This makes me wonder of if Kessler syndrome would be tougher to manage for a civilization living on an airless planet, since they'd have no significant atmosphere to help deorbit things, and even lower orbits within smaller volumes of space become possible
Hey I was wondering about the possibility of a planet being the eroded core of a gas giant in orbit of a millisecond pulsar that has a stable diamond dust ring around it, the ring being the remains of its companion star.
When I think about planets under the Kessler Effect my brain envisions similarities with the guilded cages many modern societies seem to become at a certain point of their advancement. Perhaps this tendency is a natural stage or consequence across multiple levels of the life throughout the cosmos.
Btw you really need to organize/label your ideas. It's really hard to follow sometimes, especially when you go off onto tangents and return to a main point. Adding such labels would do wonders to the watchability of your videos :)
How much fuel is typically spent just getting the rocket to start to move off the pad? Could we assist that externally using a lift if even just a little or some kind of lift of the pad to push back the exhaust a bit? Could there be any launch efficiency gained from using a silo. I'm thinking of a platform out to sea that extends a dry silo under water. Have some arms get the thing moving perhaps using dead weights while the rockets build up their pressure and the bottom pad following along. Perhaps water flows in along the side walls just enough to dampen noise and vibrations like we use massive jets of water to quite a launch now. And even the a second sleeve of the silo could extend as the ship ascends acting like the barrel of a tank canon. Just random thoughts flooding in here.
Back in the 1980s I thought people had discussed this matter, and the theory of using large magnetic fields to "clean up" various orbits was suggested.
We have an interesting time right now. There was a solar mass eruption a few days ago that has caused the upper atmosphere to heat up and swell. While SpaceX has reduced their satellite load on that Falcon 9 that went south from 60 ish to 49 Satellites, it is expected that 40 of those satellites will not be able to overcome the atmospheric drag with their ion propulsion and as a result will de-orbit again. I expect that such an effect will also clear out a small amount of that Kessler debris cloud, but it might require something much more dramatic to clear it out in a shorter period.
Imagine nomadic society of beings who offer remove orbital debris… their price is they keep the junk and minor mining rights to enough material to build and supply enough ships to take their pay to their next work site.
I don't think Keslar syndrome would do much to prevent a civilization from becoming space fairing. Most of the orbital debris is going to quickly escape orbit, fall into the planet's gravity well and most of whatever is left will heavily favor an equatorial orbit. All the civilization has to do is use a more polar orbit to get into space. In fact Keslar Syndrome would probably be quite beneficial in the very early days of space exploration because a Kg of anything that is already in orbit would be worth more than gold on the ground and it would make a lot of sense to start collecting it all together into a pile to be used to build things right in orbit. I think this is what we should be doing here around Earth, we already spent the resource getting the mass of our defected satellites, space stations and other junk up there, we should just store it all in one clump in orbit to be recycled later when we need the raw materials instead of literally burning it up in the atmosphere.
![Hunxho - Ball Forever [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/nki9ZTF9Uls/mqdefault.jpg)
The anime Planetes was the first story I saw set in such a future where the Kessler syndrome was an active risk that constantly had to be worked against. (It was a manga first, either follows the day to day of a group of space debris "cleaners", but also tackles bigger stories including geopolitical issues)
Thanks random Isaac-watcher, I'll check that anime out tonight.
@@billos3218 I hope it'll be enjoyable, it's kind of very dated in some ways by now - for instance the lack of heavy use of drones and similar automation.
@@billos3218 Planetes is great! One of my favorite animes!
I started watching Planetes because someone mentioned it on one of the futurism channels
Started watching it, I really like it! The slice of life type thing isn't something I have much experience with but it makes a refreshing change to all the anime with giant mecha fighting suits and overt Dark Lords scheming on world domination. All in all, I'm really glad I gave it a look and I plan on binging most of it soon.
With a laser sweeper, we would want to target the leading edge of debris bits, not the top. Thrusting perpendicular to the path of motion doesn't reduce the overall inertia, and is more likely to increase it if imprecise. Pushing it downward, straight toward the Nadir point, would just shift the phase of the orbit, and only nudge the actual altitude of the periapsis a tiny amount lower. What you need is a retrograde push. Slowing down along the path of motion is the fastest and cheapest way to drop the periapsis. This is a feature of orbital mechanics related to inertial momentum and conservation of energy.
Incidentally, I have over 10000 hours in KSP.. I've put enough stuff into orbit to cause Kessler Syndrome, if the game didn't have a maximum debris setting. Lol
@@graphite7473 It’s said that you need 10,000 hours of,practice to become an expert at something
You are now an expert at KSP, your degree is in the mail
@Wesley Adams it’s not the lasers themselves that cause the push, the lasers are just to heat up a small section, and that superheated section vaporizes into gas
That gas acts like a small thruster as it escapes out into the vacuum of space
I like the idea of using various forms of Kesslerization as another form of stellar terrain for planets in stories.
The sand-blaster bit explains a lot of the wear and tear on things like StarWars ships where planets have been in use for thousands of years; and it's also easy to imagine a story where the clearsky window presents a time pressure.
Simple example, imagine a mining world where the bots have gone mad, or the aliens have gotten free - or even more likely a miner's revolution cuts a bloody swath through the regular corpo indentures. The heros want to get off-world, but a disaster years ago left a Kessler cloud above that has had a narrow cooridoor blown in it.
They must make the window in a matter of hours, or else be trapped on the world as the (THING) approaches.
i bet hoth was pretty close to being kesslerred .
Did you see a South Korean sci fi film "Space Sweepers"?
You know one thought about the laser broom on regards to the "too small to track" debris:
If we had a functioning laser broom we could just have a very long course sweeping sector pattern such that over the course of X years or X months, the totality of low earth orbit got Beamed. Could probably push the sandpaper effect back to a small limit
Not sure the math works out on that?
Another idea: we could use fire to fight fire.
We could launch large quantities of sand into low orbit to sand-blast big chunks (from the occasional satellite down to finger-sized bits). The goal is to ablate debris down into more "sand" rather than breakin gthem in two Asteroids-style, but given time, either would work. After some time, one would end up with mostly "sand" and at that point, we could launch finer and finer dust to ablate the sand further. Fine dust would deorbit far sooner than sand, and sooner by orders of magnitude than big debris, so the dust would be self-clearing in a much shorter timeframe.
Since we'd want as much collision efficiency as possible, sand and dust would be launched in counter-orbit (against planetary rotation rather than with it) and would therefore require dedicated launch facilities if you want to use mass drivers. And of course, all components have to be either fine-grained, or prone to shatter into very fine debris. I'd think that some "frangible rounds" can provide a good starting point for a working design that counteracts Kessler syndrome instead of prolonging it, not sure if it works in that energy regime, tho.
In comparison, clearing Kessler syndrome from "outside" (from the moon or another planet) is almost trivial, since you can use large scale solar energy, lower launch costs, etc. And that doesn't even cover the case where a 1000-planet federation joins forces to help a single-planet polity.
This could be used as a form of interplanetary warfare designed to contain them and remove them as a potential threat rather than completely obliterating them. Just feed trillions of ball bearings in low, medium and high orbit and then just occasionally feed high orbit with more as they all slowly orbit lower and lower.
Coat them with something that doesn't reflect radar and make them ablate on contact leaving as little trace as possible. Then sit back and watch as their first early rockets get shredded just above the atmosphere and they develop a religion centred around their belief that their god simply does not wish them to leave their planet.
Just 1 tera ton conglomerate asteroid shoved into an intersecting low orbit and blown up or a magnetic accelerator in a asteroid belt pumping a stream of 1 to 100 ton lots of tailings in to their planets orbital intersection.
I actually read an ongoing reddit series where exactly that happened.
It's called the nature of predators if you're interested. It's around the chapter 125-129 mark.
I have pictured in my head a civilization that can turn the disadvantage of being a natural Kessler planet into an advantage. Find a clever way to harvest all that debris and using it to setup space infrastructure while staying close to home.
I think that’s a great idea.
Who knows what they might discover. In all that cosmetic Material.
Interesting idea.
Would it be a natural KS. Such as a ring, or space debris caused by asteroids and meteors? Or an artificial KS where an ancient advanced civilization once existed and a primitive/resurgent civilization on world discovers space flight and are currently trying to look through the junk to advance themselves?
@@emmanuelstamatakis8218 ahem, I assume you meant "cosmic" Material? Although, maybe it can be cosmetic; a cyberpunk "cobblestone" look for our orbiting stations? Maybe brick satellites? A new meaning for "built like a brick $hithouse"?
Latching onto that idea a bit, I wonder what the native ecology of such a planet might look like. In my head I'm envisioning the surface of this world cover in clouds of grit and dirt. Imagine species that've evolved to get some of their vital nutrients and intake through breathing, like filter feeders. Pure atmosphic environments might be detrimental or outright poisonous to such beings. It might be a world where "pollution" is viewed as a postive byproduct of industrialization, as it makes the air easier to breath or reduces hunger.
I"m gonna find a way to use this st some point.
I can imagine an entire recycling industry emerging from Keller Syndrome.
"You definitely want to have the means to stop it right as it begins"
If I know anything about disease spread, it's that someone will find a way to avoid doing that if it costs money.
Or, as we've seen, if it supports an ongoing political revolution.
if its anything like how the last 20 years led up to covid, it will be more a case of "sell off and sabotage anything that could be done to control it, while putting their friends in positions to profit from the crisis when it happens." even if just in relation to the majority.
I wonder about the idea of using collision cascades like this as a means for a space-faring faction to blockade a planet and keep those on it planet-bound. I love the Mobile Suit Gundam franchise, but I've always thought the Principality of Zeon should have just detonated an O'Neil cylinder in orbit, rather than crashing it into the surface of the Earth.
It wouldn't work given how armord things in Gundam are and they could always clear it... Like what is a hurricane going to do to tank?
@@GreenBlueWalkthrough I'd considered that, but given how the Side 4 shoal zone is considered too dangerous to navigate (except when it's not for plot reasons), I figure Kessler Syndrome would just be the same thing in low Earth orbit.
Kessler syndrome is a realistic way to siege/blockade a planet, through numbers alone. It takes some time to clear up the debris, so the aggressors can be sure that their target cannot instantly recover from it even if an adequate technology exists, and that the blockade cannot be simply broken from a 3rd party, through physics alone. The besieger may also always threaten to drop clusters of debris to devastating effect, though it can't be particularly accurate, but it might serve as a demoralizing deterrent to any type of prolonged hesitation to ultimatum (i.e. a medieval catapult/trebuchet effect).
A few refining ships in their asteroid belt/s flinging tailings into their planets orbit would keep a world pretty well locked down.
I guess the writers haven’t really thought about it because I’d reckon that they probably would have completely trashed the orbits by the time after CCA at the latest
I wish there was a series with a near future James Bond style hero who fought villains who always tried to conquer Earth using ideas exclusively inspired from this channel.
While I can see some kessler syndrome scenarios as being possible: I think it is also ultimately quite avoidable via basic cleanup.
Almost ALL of our LEO satellites are basically data gathering/processing instrumentation. I can envision a couple dozen practical and (currently) achievable approaches to mitigating or rapidly cleaning up LEO if this were to occur. Indeed many approaches don't even involve deorbiting into atmosphere for burnup, but instead for recycling in-orbit with orbital processing/manufacturing facilities to save on costs.
I mean .......... Look at how well we clean up earth tho :/ I could 100 percent see a company weighing the cleanup costs vs the fines and paying the "CC heater" option
how many are up there that are not even working?
@@paulhall9713 "Humanity has launched about 12,170 satellites since the dawn of the space age in 1957, according to the European Space Agency (ESA), and 7,630 of them remain in orbit today - but only about 4,700 are still operational."
around 40% and rapidly rising
@@milanstevic8424 thank you sir
Ususally I skip the sponsors and ads but some channels some deserve it, I always sit through yours.
I like the powdered sugar dekessler. Shoot many tonnes of icing sugar into a retrograde orbit. When it impacts an object it makes a small conical crater and vaporises at the bottom. That imparts its momentum to the object, but the vapour, expanding out of the crater adds even more momentum.
The effect is almost nothing on large intact sats. Small debris (paint flakes, spalling products etc) would be given a good kick, enough to deorbit them, if not immediately, then low enough that they'll deorbit from atmospheric drag quite quickly.
The sugar itself will deorbit quite promptly as each particle is low mass and high drag. So the sugar clears away naturally after doing its job.
I hadn't heard of this one! It's quite brilliant. Although, you would have to shoot it in all directions, not all satellites orbit eastward on the equator.
@@Greenicegod credit to Casey Handmer. Not my idea.
Polar might be harder, but it's a smaller problem. Continued collisions with retrograde equitorial sugar would push polar debris into a retrograde equitorial orbit. From there it could deorbit through collisions with remaining prograde debris or have a special prograde sugar mission.
Sweet! This also comes with the added benefit of creating a layer of cotton candy on the trailing edges of spacecraft that astronauts can harvest during their spacewalks - a rare treat to enjoy while in orbit. :))
I would say to people "we still can go to space with all the debris after the cascade; we'll just have to launch a tank". Liked the tank armor analogy to be mentioned.
Thank you Isaac for the best content on RUclips
I agree. Orbital collision cascade is a much better term. It describes what it is about to start. And is the term I have been using. (Or sometimes I shorten it to collision cascade. Less descriptive, but still understandable if you have given the right context.)
The solution I favour involves huge sheets or blocks of aerogel, with a thin flexible skin to contain shrapnel. In effect, giant gym mats.
This requires large scale production of aerogel in space, but this has many other uses (heat shields, insulation etc) and microgravity may even help the process of consistently making large pieces, which is the only thing holding up the widespread use of it on Earth.
Aerogel would be ineffective in Kessler syndrome mitigation.
Kessler syndrome would disrupt satellite communications, but global communications in general use more than satellites. The world is connected by fiber optic cables that run along the sea floor, AKA the internet. Countries would have minimal problems keeping up real time communications without satellites.
true but there is still a lot of damage gps clocks are used everywhere from cell towers to atms
Now that you mention your speech impediment I've only been watching the channel for about a year-and-a-half. And I've gone through a lot of the backlog and it's crazy how much it's improved since when I first started watching and now and even more so when you think about when you started to now.
BTW Satellite perturbations by solar effects, earth gravitational harmonics, atmospheric drag effects from day and night sides, and geomagnetic field all tend to INCREASE the satellite orbital speed and precess the line of nodes. It is counter-intuitive. Adding mass to them slows them down.
I can't wait for the weekend now. I've been thinking about high gravity worlds for awhile and have always wanted to know the limits of chemical rockets on high g planets, without having to do the math.
but the mathematics is the fun part 😭
Do you remember the Gravititron carnival ride? It was my favorite. I didn't know at the time but it was basically a very very small Dyson Ring with very very high gravity.
...for a given value of "basically".
@@TheArtofFugue yeah I kinda worded that poorly, partly for brevity, but the truth is I only generally think of this kinda stuff when driving, bad time for math, not sure why... just got out of the car to make this response.
@@jengleheimerschmitt7941 I both hated and loved that ride! Hated the ride but loved the concept. Also where is my missing non tied shoe? :)
@@mnemnoth I wish they'd make one with just a flat floor on the rim so you could try to move around. If I ever get rich I might have to buy one to customize.
...I could start a work-out trend. "Bulk up fast with increased gravity!"
This is the earliest i’ve caught a video of yours! Love all your thought provoking videos
"it's pretty easy to make them intentionally collide"
as an enthusiastic player of Kerbal Space Program i strongly disagree with this statement.
Just to tell you your voice/speach lesons are worth your effort. I transitioned from a professional book reader to you and had to turn down my headphones as your deep clear voice was overwhelming at the volume i had previously been required to be listening before.
Love starting my morning with some of my favorite RUclipsr!
It’s intriguing to note that ASATs offer a “conventional deference.” Because of how important satellites are in a modern economy ASATs allow a military to have such a high level of firepower to make any war against such a military “not worth the destruction caused by such a war.” It is very advantageous for a nation to develop ASATs if they can’t get nukes.
I hope you are having a good day.
Irrelevant. Major modern militaries don't fight direct wars, they do proxy wars instead. No one is going to shoot down satellites in a proxy war.
THIS CHANNEL DESERVES MORE SUBSCRIBER'S
I heard somewhere (I forget where) that one method to deorbit space debris is to send a suborbital rocket to release a cloud of icing sugar (yes, apparently this is the best material) to intersect with the apogee of the debris. The particles are small enough not to cause further break-up of the debris, but the momentum exchange is enough to drop the perigee into the atmosphere leading to rapid orbital decay. The interceptor rocket and sugar cloud meanwhile drop harmlessly straight back and burn up.
Energy required to launch to a suborbital intersect is vastly less than to orbit. Using a returnable first stage it would be possible to cost-effectively launch tens or possibly hundreds of small expendable 2nd stages with sugar payloads to bring down the most dangerous parts of a debris cloud in a single mission.
Kessler syndrome refers to a manmade phenomenon. The chaotic state of space rocks is beyond human control. Saturn's rings are an example of gravitational equilibrium following a chaotic space rock event.
With the mention of Jerry's Stories at the end I would like to mention that the sample he read on his YT channel is fantastic.
A gem of a story and YT channel.
An informative video as always Isaac.
In the Skyward books by Brandon Sanderson, the planet Detritus (where the book is based) has a shell of debris around it that seemingly keeps the belligerent aliens out. The humans live underground as debris is constantly falling to the surface.
You ever see the anime Planetes? This really makes me think of Planetes.
Starting a project on space debris mitigation but these possibilities are scary, though I'd guess if you got multiple planets with orbits industrialised you'd got a big enough drip pan.
What about capturing a comet, putting it in a ball-of-string orbit, and using it both as a gravity tug, and source of gas, to perturb the orbits of debris in orbit?
Just don't 'F' up your calculations on the mass of the comet or it'll give another species a shot at being dominant
You'll need a lot of orbital infrastructure to do that, so if you're not off world and you can't do it.
I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS EPIDSODE🤩
If I haven't said it before you're doing very well with your speech therapy I can hardly even tell that you used to struggle with your R's and to be honest I really can't say I thought you ever had a speech impediment going back to the first videos you've posted I can say you have concord it bro great job!
And keep up the excellent work on these awesome videos!
Agreed. He's made great improvement. Barely noticeable these days.
This makes me wonder if you watched the new movie MoonFall. Absolutely amazing. Has a lot to do with megastructures, trapping stars, Kessler syndrome etc. absolutely amazing movie
yall remember that scene in WALL-E?
There are places over ocean where the damage from EMP of in space nuclear detonation would be trivial. Since everything is moving you could usefully nuke the same place repeatedly.
That's one way to supercharge both the Kessler syndrome AND fill the Van Allen belts with magnitudes more ionizing radiation than it currently is, and make damn well sure that humanity never leaves the planet 😂
@@aleestuuh
Someone didn't watch the video.
why not build several habitable sensor platforms, in different orbits, to replace all the thousands of single use satellites? Governments and companies could buy subscriptions for the data these manned sensor platforms collect, rather than have to pay for their own satellite development, launch and maintenance. Upgrading technology on the platforms would be much simpler than putting up hundreds of new satellites. Collecting all the old satellites and debris would be a lot easier if it were all considered debris. I suggest really large balls of Aerogel, or something like it, that would absorb the momentum of tiny orbital projectiles, adding mass to the Aerogel until it finally slowed enough to fall into the atmosphere by itself. Even if projectiles go completely through the Aerogel, they would have slowed enough to fall. Perhaps there's a way to remotely attach Cubesats on the remaining single use satellites, so the Cubesats could increase their mass enough to change their orbit and/or reduce their velocity with orbital entry burns. This could definitely make a difference.
Hitting larger debris with blocks of ice would redirect the large object and the vaporized ice would temporarily thicken the atmosphere slowing small debris.
Super guns firing water into space would quicken the clearing of debris.
Would UV ionize small debris enough for the earth's magnetic field to add eccentricity to their orbits?
I've been thinking about civilizations that may be trapped on their home worlds lately. Besides satellites, what if radiation belts killed whatever tried to cross them?
if it’s thick enough that passing through it takes a long time then it might be a problem unless proper shielding is in place.
Now I say you could have regional Kessler syndromes, say geo or low orbit. One option for earth observation satellites and probably gps would be to go high as in well outside geo as pointed out in the video.
Now something in GEO would be very bad as stuff here does not decay because of drag.
As sad as I am hearing the ISS will be deorbited into the Pacific Ocean, I am happy there is no possibility something will crash into it and contribute to the Kessler effect further.
You mentioned having a speech impediment at the end... I could barely hear it at all. Even when I tried. Someone has been putting some work in! I for one, am impressed. That isn't easy to do. Kudos!
Find one if his early videos. He really has put the work in
SFIA: COME FOR THE SCIENCE... STAY FOR THE VOICE ❤
(Favorite voice on RUclips. This man needs an award, funny that he brings up his speech impediment on this episode lol. I listen to this channel every single day, EASY BEST VOICE ON RUclips)
There's a discussion of the hazards inside microgravity shipyards in the online comic Freefall. Florence Ambrose (a non-human gravitational engineer) mentions that these are normally enclosed to minimize the loss of high-value mass in the forms of refined materials, but the downside of that is that in some such docks, particularly the older ones, your work time isn't limited by your suit's oxygen supply, but by how long your vision plate stays transparent. (Although my favorite thing she said about ship repair and maintenance was the while any plumber could fix the plumbing on her ship, she was going to try to get a nuclear qualified structural mechanic because they charge less per hour.)
What would be cool is Kessler cannons. Say an enemy fleet is in orbit, and you want to make life difficult for them. Have lots of tunnels filled with high melting temperature future debris, and use nukes to blast it into space like the gunpowder of a cannon.
i came up with an idea for a powerful (if possibly unfeasible)
the kessler railgun:
a massive railgun loaded up with trash and scrap metal,
infrastructure
Orbital mirrors could also pull double duty. By using curved mirror to have a focal point in low orbit they could be used to push/heat debris while also spreading back to safe levels the light collected past the focal point.
Unlikely to hit anything, but free is free.
In the movie Gravity China sacrificy their Tianong space station to prevent it from contribute to the Kessler effect. I can see that as a valid way to minimize a kessler effect by deliberately mass deorbiting satellites that otherwise risk contribute to worsen the problem. This would create a boost to the satellite marked one the orbits have been cleared up.
That was more to make the Chinese look like the "good guys". The space station was small enough to alter it's altitude the few dozen meters required to avoid that movies debris field, which itself was vastly exaggerated.
@@palladin9479 as much as Hollywood sci-fi movies sacrifice realism for drama, Chinese sci-fi movies do even more. I'm assuming it's Chinese, "Gravity China film" results in zero relevant results in DDG searches.
@@squirlmy No, worse than Chinese, it's a George Clooney movie..
Ground based lasers can nudge the debri to deorbit it.
Awesome content as always 🌍💯
Well now I just feel stupid for bragging to everyone that Sharks are older than rings of Saturn. It sounded too good to be true, should have known better
I enjoyed this video and its narration greatly. It was thorough and insightful. Thank you.
my orbital mechanics was learned entirely from Kerbal Space Program. I have 5000 hours in that game. You ever need anyone to fly a space ship at the drop of a hat just call me.
"Like a Kerbal, ready to be blasted into space..."
-Tyler Durden, paraphrased.
Perfect timing! ✌🏾
Kursgesagt just did a moo crashing episode that lined up nicely
It's interesting to hear about what Kessler Syndrome is. It makes me wonder if the character Kessler from Infamous was given this name as he saw the debris of the past preventing us from reaching our future.
Global EMP from mass nuclear strike, biggest firework show ever.
Found Mrs. Arthur's muffin pan at 1:52
Grab a drink and a snack, but remember to deorbit the empty bottle and packaging afterwards!
If you ask "could a technological species be stuck planetbound because of X" the answer is no. There are plenty of things that would stop us getting to space with current tech. But we are still using the simplest and crudest of space travel tech. Another 100 years of tech progress on earth, and nothing short of a black holes event horizon will keep us down.
There are a lot of assumptions being made on your part
Great episode. Kessler Syndrome reminds me of those 'bullet hell' space shooters, but with much angrier physics. I could imagine future satellites coming equipped with laser blasters to help punch through the more difficult orbital bands on launch.
Wouldn’t a Kessler syndrome form (rather quickly) a band of debris rather than a sphere? Wouldn’t that leave two polar regions with a good clear access to set up an infrastructure?
The equatorial bulge of Earth isn't as pronounced as Saturn's, so it wouldn't form a flat disk over the equator, but yes it would tend to form a band probably similar in shape to the Van Allen belts. Every particle that isn't moving in a roughly circular orbit eastward would increase its chance of a collision.
Now here's a thought. If there were sufficiently heavy GEO satellites or a ring, they would help pull all debris into the equatorial plane where it could be mopped up more easily. It would have the same effect on the Van Allen belts too.
@@MattOGormanSmith Actually it would form a pretty narrow ring pretty quickly. If the debris is so bad that objects can't safely travel through it, then nothing can persist very long in LEO unless nearly all the remaining debris has the same low inclination.
Just put up a solar sail. Decays quickly and any object hit will be broken into smaller chunks and thus also decay faster.
Maybe they'll make some kind of shield that can either plow right through or vaporize the debris without damaging the ship.
I think it won't be a big issue once we actually start working in space.
Recycling will be the solution if there cost of recycling the material in space is less than the cost to get it into space.
"Orbital Collision Cascade"
Awesome phrase.
Could Aerogel be used as armor for ships/satelites?
Its quite strong and also very light. Presumably this means you could get a lot of it (or base materials to make it) up per launch. And then cover whatver you want in a thick layer.
If you have to bother about lifting weight out of a planet then maybe it’s not yet time to have armor
@@trevorle7382 Currently all human inhabited spacecraft and satelites have some form of armor to protect against small debris. Usually done through a sacrificial outer layer. The debris begins to vaporise on impact and said vapor is less likely to penetrate the inner layers. It has been time for armor since humans made it to space.
@@capturedflame but it’s not strong enough. Like Issac always said, nothing can rival dumb matter. Strength comes with weight. Aerogel is light, meaning not dense, meaning not great armor. It only takes 1980s weapons to make aerogel useless. The best armor we have right now includes
steel-cheap and strong,
titanium- lighter than steel(not stronger),
plastic :v but again, should be used with steel,
ceramic materials-which are not that lightweight,
and lastly, URANIUM238 - which is undoubtedly heavy. Only the US afford to use Uranium on their tanks
So in space, railgun round will punch through almost any reasonable amount of Aerogel used as armor, and put a hole in the steel hull behind it
@@morgankooman yes, that comment of mine was not literal, but more like exaggerated and sarcastic. The thing is that’s not meant to act as armor in space combat. Even in navies, armors have been forfeit for it’s helplessness to defend against modern weaponry. Ultra-lightweight materials like aerogel that he proposed are too weak, and even if it wasn’t, they must be used in larger quantities, making us a big target for debris to wear down over time
(Oh and aerogel is insulative, so we’ll have to work on waste heat radiators more)
new episode, so many ideas packed in such a short time
Oh Saturn's rings are actually really old? I thought the whole "Sharks are older than Saturn's rings" was a thing.
Issac is a pioneer and a great teacher!
Imposing a Kessler Effect would be a good form of punishment to a planet that got out of line in the Galactic Order.
Could you start a chain reaction that would encourage debris to collect itself into larger groups, or into “lanes”? Making it easier to catalogue and remove?
It might be fun to put up a big ball of gel in front of a particular piece of debris and see if the resulting inelastic collision could send the ball over in front of another piece, and play pinball all the way down.
I think a good general practice for all LEO satellites is to have an Electrodynamic Tether on board. Basically it's a long conducting wire that that experiences drag as it moves through earth's magnetic field. This electrodynamic drag deorbits the craft way faster than just atmospheric drag.
It would be used as a fail-safe option for dead craft. No sign of life for 24 hours? Ruelease the tether. As a bonus, the tether produces a current, so there's an additional chance to recover the craft if it experienced a non-permanent power failure.
Fans of Neil Stephenson might recognize this technology from Seveneves, known therein as a Lamprey.
I reject the notion that Kessler syndrome would make LEO impassible. If the collision cascade ever reached a point where any ship attempting to pass through was quickly destroyed that would mean the debris itself would be subject to frequent collisions. And with each collision the objects fragment into a large number of much smaller pieces. And many of those pieces would be on orbits with sufficiently low perigees that they would quickly reenter. Kessler syndrome would probably destroy all of our current satellites and might result in a ring of very fine debris over the equator, but it wouldn't form an impassable barrier.
If we had a Bunch of O-Neil cylinders orbiting the Earth what would stop a rogue individual from flying theirs into another causing Kessler syndrome or even worst would they be able to fly it directly into the earth at a major city or would it completely burn up in the atmosphere? I assume we’d have some sort of defensive system around Earth once we get to that point.
One would probably hope that by the time we got to that point, we (as a species) would have evolved to the point where we cared enough about other members of our species that something like you are suggesting would be unthinkable/unconciounable. Also, I would severly hope that with something as large as an O'neill cylinder, control for altering course would not be in the full control of a single person and "defenses" would not be needed.
Sorry to say, but even one person asking a question like yours just goes to show that the cultures and societies we have formed as a species are not ready to venture out past our little corner of space yet. IMHO anyway.
@@ravencrovax mental illnesses exist now and, barring a genius neuroscience breakthrough, will exist in the future too. Not that all with mental illness would do such a thing but still, all it takes is one truly insane individual and some bad luck.
@cxxx the best defence for this is time, most likely any orbital infrastructure is going to be hours away from each other, if not more. If someone does try to crash an o'neil cylinder, people will notice and probably break that guys arms.
O neil cylinders are very large and would require a lot of energy to move so if one goes rogue then the others are likely going to be able to avoid it.
@@ravencrovax I would hope no one commits such an act either but in a population of trillions it probably wouldn’t be hard to find a group willing to do It therefore defense systems will probably be necessary. I disagree that having precautions means we aren’t ready for space expansion, but I hope you’d be right
love the Tie-Fighter debris :D
Couldn't we use a parachute-like object attached, say, to a drone to collect the debris?
when you think about it, a galaxy is basicly just a Kessler effekt around a supermassive black hole.
A hypothetical planet called Rouch that's about earth size but locked in orbit with a larger body so that the near side has significantly less apparent gravity.
I suspect it couldn't really exist as a habitable place but it makes an interesting setting for a story of aliens reaching space early on with low technology just because it's a relatively easy thing once they've made the trip to the near side.
To have such a system where one planet would counteract a significant amount of the gravity of the other, the orbiting planets would need to be so close together that they'd be almost inside the roche limit, where gravity will start to rip apart both celestial bodies.
Having the rest of the solar system cut off for a century is tragic for us, but is far less bad than what I originally thought
I know, right? Imagine the tech that progresses in that century.
well, it's been a half century since manned moon exploration, so not too far from kind of situation as we have now.
What i find most concerning about Kessler Syndrome is the potential nuclear war that it could entail. Since SSBMs are not constantly able to contact their respective governments, if a commander of such a vessel has a reason to assume that a nuclear war destroyed said government, they have authorization to initiate an attack on their own. The scary thing about this is that such communication would be satellite based.
This makes me wonder of if Kessler syndrome would be tougher to manage for a civilization living on an airless planet, since they'd have no significant atmosphere to help deorbit things, and even lower orbits within smaller volumes of space become possible
Hey I was wondering about the possibility of a planet being the eroded core of a gas giant in orbit of a millisecond pulsar that has a stable diamond dust ring around it, the ring being the remains of its companion star.
"A beautiful place to live, albeit a deadly one."
So you're saying it's space Australia?
When I think about planets under the Kessler Effect my brain envisions similarities with the guilded cages many modern societies seem to become at a certain point of their advancement. Perhaps this tendency is a natural stage or consequence across multiple levels of the life throughout the cosmos.
@maria ekman the Tina foil head's a bit to tight, huh...?
Most cases of poor grammar here is an atocorrect hiccup:)
@@BlockedUser420 lets be honest, no one would take them seriously anyway
Btw you really need to organize/label your ideas. It's really hard to follow sometimes, especially when you go off onto tangents and return to a main point. Adding such labels would do wonders to the watchability of your videos :)
Global nuking of orbit. Aliens will think we've finally killed ourselves
Oh this is going to be good
Imagine an atom with Kessler syndrome so bad that light can't even escape.
What about a large cotton wool to clean the orbit from smaller debris?
Could you have a net at higher than orbital velocity forced into an constant altitude orbit collect all the debris in a ball of twine orbit?
How much fuel is typically spent just getting the rocket to start to move off the pad? Could we assist that externally using a lift if even just a little or some kind of lift of the pad to push back the exhaust a bit? Could there be any launch efficiency gained from using a silo. I'm thinking of a platform out to sea that extends a dry silo under water. Have some arms get the thing moving perhaps using dead weights while the rockets build up their pressure and the bottom pad following along. Perhaps water flows in along the side walls just enough to dampen noise and vibrations like we use massive jets of water to quite a launch now. And even the a second sleeve of the silo could extend as the ship ascends acting like the barrel of a tank canon. Just random thoughts flooding in here.
Back in the 1980s I thought people had discussed this matter, and the theory of using large magnetic fields to "clean up" various orbits was suggested.
Outstanding video graphics and content. Wow!
We have an interesting time right now. There was a solar mass eruption a few days ago that has caused the upper atmosphere to heat up and swell. While SpaceX has reduced their satellite load on that Falcon 9 that went south from 60 ish to 49 Satellites, it is expected that 40 of those satellites will not be able to overcome the atmospheric drag with their ion propulsion and as a result will de-orbit again. I expect that such an effect will also clear out a small amount of that Kessler debris cloud, but it might require something much more dramatic to clear it out in a shorter period.
Imagine nomadic society of beings who offer remove orbital debris… their price is they keep the junk and minor mining rights to enough material to build and supply enough ships to take their pay to their next work site.
I don't think Keslar syndrome would do much to prevent a civilization from becoming space fairing. Most of the orbital debris is going to quickly escape orbit, fall into the planet's gravity well and most of whatever is left will heavily favor an equatorial orbit. All the civilization has to do is use a more polar orbit to get into space. In fact Keslar Syndrome would probably be quite beneficial in the very early days of space exploration because a Kg of anything that is already in orbit would be worth more than gold on the ground and it would make a lot of sense to start collecting it all together into a pile to be used to build things right in orbit. I think this is what we should be doing here around Earth, we already spent the resource getting the mass of our defected satellites, space stations and other junk up there, we should just store it all in one clump in orbit to be recycled later when we need the raw materials instead of literally burning it up in the atmosphere.