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Japan goes fishing for space junk, but 700 meters of “tether” fail | place

An experimental Japanese mission to clear space debris from orbit has failed, officials said Monday, embarrassing Tokyo.

More than 100 million pieces of trash are believed to be whizzing around the planet, including discarded equipment from old satellites and rocket parts that experts say could pose risks to future space exploration.

Scientists from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) attempted to test an electrodynamic “tether” created with the help of a fishing net company to slow the circulating garbage and bring it into lower orbit.

The hope was that the mess – built up after more than five decades of human exploration of space – would eventually penetrate the earth’s atmosphere and burn away harmlessly before it could crash onto the planet.

The 700-meter-long line – made of thin wires made of stainless steel and aluminum – was to be extended by a cargo ship launched in December to supply astronauts on the International Space Station with relief supplies.

The problems emerged quickly, however, and technicians spent days trying to fix the problem but only had a week to complete the mission before the ship reentered Earth’s atmosphere on the Monday before sunrise.

“We believe the tether has not been released,” said lead researcher Koichi Inoue. “It is certainly disappointing that we completed the mission without achieving any of the main goals.”

The disappointment is the recent failure to meet Jaxa and comes just weeks after the agency was forced to abandon a mission that attempted to launch a satellite into orbit with a mini-missile.

The agency also abandoned a satellite launched last February to check for X-rays emanating from black holes and galaxy clusters after it lost contact with the spacecraft.

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