‘Space cleaner’ satellite spotted grabbing and throwing away old satellite

Wow. In the beginning I found the article interesting before (in my subjective eyes) it turned into a thinly veiled Anti-China propaganda piece.<p>But I have to admit as a propaganda piece it was done quite well. Pull interested readers in letting them swallow the hook.<p>Then broaden the scope to tell the reader that other, more US friendly nations are currently either testing the concept or planning something in the future. While not pointing out that the US seemingly do not to have cleanup missions planned.<p>Then question your own propaganda in a not very believable manner but still in the end leave the reader doubting the intentions of the Chinese.<p>Mission accomplished.<p>The best part: Try to find on the site who is behind that publication. No imprint. Nothing about the editorial team. Nothing about the company.<p>I actually don&#x27;t trust media outlets that don&#x27;t tell who the are. But that might just be my German upbringing where media is being required by law to disclose at least the company and the editorial board&#x2F;staff.<p>-----<p>Update for transparency reasons as separate part<p>Having read about the publication behind this site I admit that they seem to be one of the better structures in media all over the world.<p>I recommend reading about the reason why it was founded [0].<p>Still the piece per se irks me. But I give the the benefit of the doubt and would not call it propaganda anymore.<p>[0]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;The_Wire_%28India%29?wprov=sfla1" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;The_Wire_%28India%29?wprov=sfl...</a>

Pretty cool exercise.<p>I wonder why governments are concerned over military use with this technology. If anyone wanted to bring a satellite down, wouldn&#x27;t it be easier to just blow it up with a projectile&#x2F;hack it&#x2F;jam it&#x2F;laser it? The military option of developing a complicated satellite robot to push satellites off orbit sounds stupid.

The ExoAnalytic video mentioned in the article: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=UDCLpXCB62w" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=UDCLpXCB62w</a>

As a random thought experiment, would a spacex starship with some sort of unfolding kilometre-scale &quot;net&quot; (made of aerogel or whatever) be able to effectively sweep common orbital planes for the microscopic bits of crap floating around? Then furl the net all back up in the cargo bay, land and recycle&#x2F;dispose of the debris?<p>I am guessing - given that starship is planned to be able to go to mars - that there is enough fuel and power available that it&#x27;d be fairly trivial to just scoop up defunct satellites in the huge cargo hold and deorbit them safely for refurbishment&#x2F;disposal on the ground. (After all they&#x27;ve shown they can rendevous with ISS etc so I am guessing this is largely the same approach to rendevous with a dead satellite) Guessing you could comfortably hold quite a few satellites inside a starship meaning one launch could collect a whole range of dead satellites?

Perhaps they are making amends after their missile test and it’s debris generating aftermath? <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nytimes.com&#x2F;2021&#x2F;11&#x2F;10&#x2F;science&#x2F;china-debris-space-station.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nytimes.com&#x2F;2021&#x2F;11&#x2F;10&#x2F;science&#x2F;china-debris-spac...</a>

Another explanation might be dispose the old one before it was captured by other countries, otherwise the potential harm could be too great.

This will be a fun cat and mouse game when sats are rigged to catch one of these and explode.

&quot;China clears space junk, but at what cost?!&quot;

It&#x27;s a Chinese satellite and it&#x27;s obviously worrying the US because it can theoretically be used to interfere with their military satellites.

wow cool.

This would be a great US engineering accomplishment but it&#x27;s a terrible Chinese accomplishment because it may be used in war. As if the US is not capable of and eager to weaponise absolutely everything!<p>This shows China is ahead in the space race.