The United Kingdom Is Launching Giant Claws Into Orbit to Clean Up Space Junk. You Can Help Name the First-of-Its-Kind Mission

The spacecraft is designed to drag two dead satellites into Earth’s atmosphere, where they are expected to disintegrate. The mission is slated to launch in 2029 and be completed by 2032 October 27, 2026 11:26 a.m. An artistic rendering of ClearSpace U.K.'s planned spacecraft © ClearSpace Satellites are cluttering Earth orbit, and the defunct ones are considered human-made junk. Now, the United Kingdom is developing a first-of-its-kind mission to clean up after its space program that could pave the way toward a long-term strategy for mitigating the risks of space debris. The U.K.’s Active Debris Removal (U.K. ADR) mission aims to send a refuelable spacecraft with giant robotic claws into Earth orbit to grab two dead satellites and fling them into our planet’s atmosphere, where they will burn up, according to a government statement. The spacecraft is slated to launch from Scotland in 2029 and will be built by the U.K. branch of ClearSpace, an in-orbit servicing company. “We have designed the claw because that gives us effectively the ability to go after spacecraft of all shapes and sizes, but also, we’ve designed a very maneuverable spacecraft,” Robert Atchison, managing director of ClearSpace U.K., tells Sky News’ Thomas Moore. “So, as things move through space, if it’s tumbling or moving, we can match that and then still grapple with the spacecraft.” ClearSpace UK ADR Mission If all goes according to plan, the roughly $80 million mission would prove that a single spacecraft can successfully get rid of more than one dead satellite, which could render future missions of this sort more practical, Kurt Knutsson reports for Fox News. The U.K. ADR mission is expected to be completed by 2032. “Space junk and debris pose an immense and growing challenge,” U.K. Space Minister Liz Lloyd says in a ClearSpace statement. “By backing this world-first mission, we will protect the satellites that underpin modern life from keeping us connected with loved ones and delivering accurate weather forecasts to keeping our country safe.” The U.K. Space Agency has launched a competition to name its trash-disposal mission. The public can enter suggestions until December 10, 2026. Around 1,000 working satellites orbited Earth in 2019, but the number has skyrocketed in recent years, Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist who recently retired from the Center for Astrophysics, Harvard & Smithsonian, told Smithsonian magazine’s Dan Falk last year. As of late October, nearly 17,000 active satellites are circling our planet, according to the tracker SatFleet Live. Quick fact: Starlink’s satellites More than 11,000 of the active satellites—around 66 percent—belong to the satellite internet service company Starlink, part of SpaceX. But there’s much more than satellites above our heads. In fact, there are almost 32,000 trackable objects larger than about four inches. That means that roughly half of those objects are space debris, things like spent satellites, defunct rockets and even bits of paint. Ideally, this junk eventually falls into Earth’s atmosphere, where it completely disintegrates from intense pressure and friction. But not all of it does so in a timely manner. “There’s a lot of stuff orbiting the Earth in low-Earth orbit. Some bits of junk date back to the Cold War, whether it’s communication satellites or spy satellites or whatever stuff going back 40, 50, probably even 60 years, in some cases. So, there is some stuff that’s been up there for a while,” Falk, a science journalist, told Ari Daniel on Smithsonian magazine’s “There’s More to That” podcast last year. The objects that stick around become a collision threat for other things in space, such as other satellites, spacecraft and even orbital stations like the International Space Station. Furthermore, a single crash could result in more debris, which could subsequently cause more collisions, essentially triggering a chain reaction, according to David Szondy at New Atlas. Still, even if successful, ClearSpace U.K.’s spacecraft doesn’t address all the issues regarding space debris. Objects that re-enter Earth’s atmosphere sometimes make it through, such as the “space balls” discovered on an Australian beach this past summer. In 2024, around 124 rocket stages re-entered the atmosphere in an uncontrolled manner, Ewan Wright, a space environment specialist at the University of British Columbia in Canada, told Space.com’s Leonard David in September. “If that level is sustained for the next decade, the risk of someone somewhere being killed by rocket debris alone is 33 percent.” You Might Also Like Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday. More about: England Northern Ireland Outer Space Satellites Scientific Innovation Scotland SpaceX Wales