第1594期:Space junk

Many of us ponder what lies in outer space. When we look up at the night sky, we see stars, the twinkle of a moving satellite and occasionally a distant planet. But one thing we don’t see is the millions of pieces of junk filling up space. It’s this debris that’s causing problems for the existing technology that’s up there and which we rely on.

我们中的许多人都在思考外层空间的内容。当我们仰望夜空时，我们会看到星星，移动卫星的闪烁，偶尔还有一颗遥远的行星。但我们看不到的一件事是数百万块垃圾填满了空间。正是这些碎片给我们所依赖的现有技术带来了问题。

The amount of space junk is increasing. Over the last few decades, satellites and rockets have been launched into space, littering the cosmos as they go. It’s estimated there are now millions of discarded pieces of metal and other materials in orbit – everything from old rocket segments to accidentally dropped astronaut tools, and even flecks of paint. The fear is that if we don’t start taking this litter out of the sky soon, it will become a significant threat to active satellites. Nobu Okada, Chief Executive of Astroscale – a company working on ways to clean up space junk – says hitting “even a small paint fleck… has enough power to blow up other satellites.”

太空垃圾的数量正在增加。在过去的几十年里，卫星和火箭被发射到太空中，随处可见的垃圾。据估计，现在轨道上有数百万件废弃的金属和其他材料——从旧火箭部件到意外掉落的宇航员工具，甚至是油漆斑点。令人担忧的是，如果我们不尽快开始将这些垃圾带出天空，它将成为对活动卫星的重大威胁。致力于清理太空垃圾的公司 Astroscale 的首席执行官 Nobu Okada 表示，“即使是一个小的油漆斑点……也有足够的力量炸毁其他卫星。”

Several ideas are being looked at to capturethe debris floating around in space. In 2018, the RemoveDebris spacecraft carried out various experiments, including testing a net that could snare a satellite and firing a harpoon at a target in orbit to try to catch it.

正在研究几种想法来捕捉漂浮在太空中的碎片。 2018 年，RemoveDebris 航天器进行了各种实验，包括测试可以诱捕卫星的网，并向轨道上的目标发射鱼叉以试图捕捉它。

This year the UK Space Agency is helping to fund new approaches to tracking satellites and debris in space. Jacob Geer from UKSA told the BBC: “Space surveillance and tracking is one of the key things we can do to keep safe those satellites we rely on now, and to make sure certain orbits don’t become inaccessible for future generations because there’s too much debris in them.”

今年，英国航天局正在帮助资助追踪太空卫星和碎片的新方法。来自 UKSA 的 Jacob Geer 告诉 BBC：“太空监视和跟踪是我们可以做的关键事情之一，以确保我们现在依赖的那些卫星的安全，并确保某些轨道不会因为有太多里面有碎片。”

It’s clear that a solution is needed so a celestial deep clean can take place. But looking to the future, like any litter problem, we need to look at ways of creating less – and that shouldn’t be the stuff of science fiction.

很明显，需要一种解决方案才能进行天体深层清洁。但展望未来，就像任何垃圾问题一样，我们需要寻找减少创造的方法——这不应该是科幻小说的内容。

词汇表

outer space 外层空间，太空
twinkle 闪烁，闪耀
satellite 人造卫星
junk 废弃的旧东西，垃圾
debris 碎片，残片
rocket 火箭
launch 发射
litter 丢弃垃圾
the cosmos 宇宙
orbit （天体围绕行星或恒星运行的）轨道
segment （事物的） 部分，段
astronaut 宇航员
float 漂浮
spacecraft 宇宙飞船
snare 用罗网捕捉
space surveillance and tracking 宇宙空间监视跟踪系统
celestial 天空的，天外的
deep clean 深层清洁
science fiction 科幻小说，科幻电影