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Originally Posted by Daradon
OK, obviously I don't know all they know, but that sounds a little far fetched to me. I could see two colliding, but then wouldn't that pretty much disrupt their orbit enough to either fling them into space or have them crash to the earth? How would they continue flying around hitting more and more satellites?
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The thing is that geo-synchronous satellites can be moving at up to 36,000 KPH. Collisions between satelllites or any other space debris spawn even more debris and shrapnel moving at similar speeds. In space there is no friction and momentum and inertia keep things moving at high speeds unless their orbits decay and they burn up in the atmosphere. The possibility of a collision resulting in enough energy to escape orbit is unlikely. Any collisions can potentially spawn a lot of shrapnel that flies off in other directions and send things into non-standard orbits.
Google it. I think it's called Kessler's Syndrome or something like that, from some NASA paper.
Space Debris is actually a very serious issue. That's why everything is designed to be able to recover or burn up safely after it's fullfilled it's purpose. There's also a lot of research into ways to safely get rid of space debris like laser brooms. If you look at all the problems and tragedies with the space shuttle and how even small impacts by things as benign as foam can cause catostrophic destruction, any hit at high speeds (Shuttle travels at like 30,000 KPH) is very deadly and often Shuttles come back with many signs of impact with space debris.