Swiss Building Satellite to Collect and Remove Space Junk From Earth's Orbit

Updated May 5, 2017, originally posted on April 3, 2012

Swiss scientists at the the Swiss Space Center at EPFL are building a satellite, called CleanSpace One, designed to clean up space junk. The satellite will have tentacle-like arms to grab and remove space junk from Earth's orbit. A cube-like Swiss satellite, the Swisscube picosatellite, will be the target of the Swiss space junk collector. The Swiss Space Center says CleanSpace One is destined to be destroyed, but future janitor satellites could be reusable and designed as sustainably as possible.

Here's an animation of CleanSpace One from EPFL. Take a look:

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