Uploaded January 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 hours ago
RAS January Public Talk - Prof Mike Lockwood at 6pm
We Need To talk ... About Space Junk
Space is an incredibly valuable resource - amongst a huge number of applications are: communications; broadcasting; navigation and positioning; weather and climate observation; natural resources exploration; experiments and materials production in zero gravity; astronomical science; and disaster monitoring. But our use of space is increasingly limited and threatened by space junk. This is ranges in size from particles and flecks of paint as small as sand grains (which can do serious damage to spacecraft because they collide with such large velocities), to defunct satellites and rocket booster stages. The problem is getting worse – for example there has been a marked increase in the number of evasive manoeuvres that the space station has required to dodge large pieces of space junk. The concern is a runaway effect called the Kessler syndrome, in which the debris from one collision causes many other, to the point where space becomes unusable. In his talk, Professor Lockwood will look at the various types of orbit and discuss what measures can be adopted for each to reduce the problem.
About our speaker
Mike Lockwood is a professor of space environment physics at the University of Reading. He has studied how the Sun influences the near-Earth space environment and how those interactions have changed over recent centuries. He was previously chairman of the governing council that runs the EISCAT radars in northern Scandinavia which, amongst other applications, can monitor space junk. In particular, these radars directly observed the large increase in debris generated by a ‘star wars’ missile test on a defunct weather satellite.
RAS January Public Talk - Prof Mike Lockwood at 6pm
We Need To talk ... About Space Junk
Space is an incredibly valuable resource - amongst a huge number of applications are: communications; broadcasting; navigation and positioning; weather and climate observation; natural resources exploration; experiments and materials production in zero gravity; astronomical science; and disaster monitoring. But our use of space is increasingly limited and threatened by space junk. This is ranges in size from particles and flecks of paint as small as sand grains (which can do serious damage to spacecraft because they collide with such large velocities), to defunct satellites and rocket booster stages. The problem is getting worse – for example there has been a marked increase in the number of evasive manoeuvres that the space station has required to dodge large pieces of space junk. The concern is a runaway effect called the Kessler syndrome, in which the debris from one collision causes many other, to the point where space becomes unusable. In his talk, Professor Lockwood will look at the various types of orbit and discuss what measures can be adopted for each to reduce the problem.
About our speaker
Mike Lockwood is a professor of space environment physics at the University of Reading. He has studied how the Sun influences the near-Earth space environment and how those interactions have changed over recent centuries. He was previously chairman of the governing council that runs the EISCAT radars in northern Scandinavia which, amongst other applications, can monitor space junk. In particular, these radars directly observed the large increase in debris generated by a ‘star wars’ missile test on a defunct weather satellite.
