The pollution of outer space

The Baltimore Sun

On July 24, the Associated Press announced, "A spacewalking astronaut, Clayton C. Anderson, discarded a camera mounting and an ammonia tank weighing more than half a ton at the International Space Station. The outdated equipment ... joined more than 9,000 pieces of orbital debris already being tracked from Earth."

Space debris poses a huge problem for our future - a problem that could be made much worse by U.S. plans to introduce weapons into space.

A piece of debris in low Earth orbit travels at 17,000 miles per hour. A 10-pound piece hits with the kinetic power of a 50-mph truck, and can completely destroy a satellite. Many thousands of small pieces, too small to be included in the 9,000 figure cited by the Associated Press, can nevertheless do substantial damage. Collisions with space debris have already caused low-level harm.

This orbiting junkyard renders vulnerable the entire series of satellites that have changed our world in the last few decades. These include positioning satellites, which tell us where we are driving in our car, or tell a pilot or sea captain where his plane or ship is. They include weather satellites, which for the first time in our planetary history give us an accurate worldwide weather system. They also include communication satellites, which connect us to people all over the world, facilitating personal and business communications. And they include scientific satellites, which for the first time have given astronomers the chance to view the cosmos outside the fog of the atmosphere.

Space debris places all this at risk. Worse, should the U.S. military move ahead with its plans to weaponize space, the testing required - especially if other nations follow suit - would lead to a level of debris perhaps 10 times higher than the 9,000 pieces presently being tracked. This would jeopardize the entire system of peaceful satellites upon which the world depends.

These plans can be stopped.

All space-faring nations but the United States are ready to sign a treaty banning weapons from outer space, extending the 1967 Outer Space Treaty that bans only weapons of mass destruction. The 1967 treaty makes clear that nations should not interfere with the peaceful uses of outer space by other countries, which the creation of debris clearly does.

It is time that the United States joins its global neighbors and signs on to a treaty banning all weapons in outer space, thus protecting this region from the destructive proliferation of debris. This treaty would also secure outer space for peaceful purposes.

Unfortunately, President Bush issued an edict in October stating that the United States would not sign any treaty that inhibited its actions in outer space. It is high time the Bush administration joins the rest of the advanced world in protecting our peaceful satellites.

Craig Eisendrath, co-author of "War in Heaven: The Arms Race in Outer Space," worked on the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. His e-mail is creisen@aol.com.

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