MIT Technology Review  February 15, 2019 Right now there are more than 7,600 tons of space junk floating around our planet. Researchers in the UK created a satellite called the RemoveDEBRIS which fired a harpoon at 20 meters a second at a separate satellite panel that it was holding at the end of a boom. The harpoon succeeded in stabbing and capturing the item. Last year the team also “accurately fired a giant net” https://www.technologyreview.com/the-download/612174/satellite-uses-giant-net-to-trap-spinning-bit-of-space-junk/ at a satellite to capture it and tested out a lidar- and camera-based system for identifying space junk. The final test by RemoveDEBRIS in March […]