SALT LAKE CITY (ABC 4 News) – The sky might not be falling, but a lot of space junk is. This traffic jam in outer space could interfere with parts of your daily life.
16,000 pieces of space junk are out there, moving at 17,000 miles an hour.
Seth Jarvis at Clark Planetarium put it into perspective, he said “A grain of rice at this speed is the equivalent of a guy my size crashing into you on a motorcycle
That’s a grain of rice, imagine something bigger.
Jarvis said, “It's like setting off a bomb if it hits something.”
There are all sizes of space junk out there; made by nature and man. While this might seem like just a mess, it’s a real problem. It’s not as much a worry of junk falling to the earth, although that has happened, but the real problem is collisions.
Jarvis said, “What if that satellite smacks into a stray bolt?”
If there is a collision with a satellite for your cell phone, internet, TV – we would have serious issues.
Jarvis said, “We have turned our lifestyle into something that requires satellites to work.”
Clark Planetarium wants you to learn about this junk, they have a new movie: Space Junk showing the problem and solutions the world is coming up with.
Space Junk opens Friday and runs through the summer.
