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Musk is the biggest polluter of space

In 2023 alone, SpaceX has carried out 98 of the world's 223 orbital launches, leaving behind a lot of junk

Jul 12, 2024 14:11 208

The American corporation SpaceX is responsible for most of the space junk . Journalists from Jalopnik came to this conclusion.

The authors of the media examined a report by the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs on the amount of debris in space. From the data in it, it follows that in 2023 there were 2,664 objects in space that are generally considered to be junk. 2,166 of them are related to US space programs.

„The United States is responsible for the leading share of the increase in garbage. Someone else must be behind this" - noted the authors and blamed the head of SpaceX Elon Musk for the increase in the amount of garbage. According to Jalopnik experts, Musk's corporation launches 90 percent of the objects that belong to the United States into space.

„In 2023 alone, SpaceX carried out 98 of the 223 orbital launches in the world, leaving behind a lot of junk“, the journalists emphasize.

For comparison, in 2023 Russia had 62 space debris, Great Britain - 144, China - 128, Japan - 11, France - 10, India - 6, Germany - 2.

On the night of July 10, residents of several Russian regions noticed an unusual glowing object in the sky. As it turned out, the mystery ball turned out to be a heavy European Ariane 6 launch vehicle.