There's team working on that! Give me a minute to fin a link.

edit:

I was thinking of the Clearspace but apparently Astroscale is doing it too.

"Europe plans space claw to capture orbiting junk | Science | AAAS" https://www.science.org/content/article/europe-plans-space-claw-capture-orbiting-junk

"Astroscale's space junk removal satellite aces 1st orbital test | Space" https://www.space.com/astroscale-first-space-junk-capture-demonstration

Maybe a set of satellites linked together with a steel mesh "net" (kind of like how we clean up the Pacific Ocean).

Four satellites, in a diamond pattern; with a net splayed between them?

"ClearSpace - A mission to make space sustainable" https://clearspace.today

Shredded by relative speeds. A net wouldn’t stop something traveling at thousands of feet per second, and if it was going slower, it’s take literal millennia to clean ip

Have you seen the damage even small pieces of space debris can do? At those speeds, stuff rips right through steel like it's butter.

The problem with space debris is that many of the pieces are in drastically different orbits - especially the debris from ASAT tests - and there's no easy way to deal with that.

It's quite expensive fuel-wise to get from one orbit to another - especially at the altitudes where debris is the biggest issue - and you will need to somehow capture debris that might be coming at your satellite at thousands of meters per second of velocity. You need to make sure it doesn't hit your satellite and create more debris.

There a great series on the subject.... link

Oh I've seen the pictures of what a speck of paint does to a aluminum block (with a huge crater).

I was just thinking out loud.

Sorry.

ESA purchases world-first debris removal mission from start-up

[removed]

Hello u/sirinath, your submission "Cleaning Space Debris" has been removed from r/space because:

• Such questions should be asked in the "All space questions" thread stickied at the top of the sub.

Please read the rules in the sidebar and check r/space for duplicate submissions before posting. If you have any questions about this removal please message the r/space moderators. Thank you.