Space junk/debris

[Urb4n0ninj4]

In case anyone wants to feel better about how much they pollute their Kerbin orbit...

http://www.alexras.info/code/orbital_objects/

I feel much better about myself. I also kind of want to try to accomplish this much junk.

[phoenix_ca]

Relevant:

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Operations/Ground_Systems_Engineering/ESA_Space_Debris_Office

Also, holy crap, that's a lot of crap we threw up there. O.O

[Caelib]

That's awesome and disturbing all at the same time.

[Madrias]

Ugh! Now is when I hate being red/green colorblind...

[Epthelyn]

Ugh! Now is when I hate being red/green colorblind...

Most of it's red, except the geostationary ring of active satellites

Of course there are active things elsewhere but there's a massive amount of debris by comparison

[phoenix_ca]

Ugh! Now is when I hate being red/green colorblind...

Protanopia/deuteronopia? Give me a few minutes. I'll work on screenshot for you that should work.

Edit: Here you go. The red satellites should show as a blue-ish hue. I adjusted the green ones so they should be more contrasty.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5296507/WebGL_Globe_protanopia-safe.png

It should work for almost all colour-blindness types except the monochromatic ones.

I wish there was a clear indication of who made that map. I would give them a stern talking-to when it comes to presenting data using colour.

Edited May 26, 2014 by phoenix_ca

[Duke23]

Looks like my .23 save as far as debris goes... I wasn't very "green" and often left 6-8 large pieces in stable orbit per launch. I made a lot of launches. In all seriousness though, wow. They really need to clean that up or we're gonna have a Gravity type event pretty soon, I think. That's just a bit insane.

[KerbMav]

I would have expected more of a mess actually - if we take into acount how much distance there is between one red dot and the next ...

Ugh! Now is when I hate being red/green colorblind...

"Funnily" I am as well - but seemingly to a different degree, as I can distinguish them quite good this time ...

[problemecium]

Someday I dream of running a space company with a policy of every mission leaving Earth orbit with fewer things in it than it had when we launched. At least for the first few decades.

[Jon Tash]

It's funny to think that this is our very own low tier Planetary Shield (just like in other sci-fi games) against aliens? I was thinking about the movie Battleship, the scene where the spaceships are about to enter the atmosphere and one of the ship is hit by a satellite.

Interesting to see so many out there though. I say, let them stay there, they might be useful someday.

[KerbMav]

Translation:

"Report, Sub-blob!"

"Chief-blob, first planet is a hot barren rock, the second has a highly toxic atmosphere, third is a fractured metal ball, fourth one a dry dusty rock ... there are no organic materials, sensors do not detect water in usable amounts - nothing to hunt, nothing to refuel, suggest we pass on this system!"

...

"Well done, Lieutenant. Now bring this transcript to the President and advise him to maintain the order for radio silence. We might just be able to sit this one out - again."

[Capt. Hunt]

I should point out that even in near Earth Orbit, space is extremely vast and mostly empty, the chance of encountering space debris is extremely low. Unless we did something like intentionally cause a Kessler syndrome, Space debris would make poor planetary shield.