Dr Moriba Jah: the increasing threat of space junk

Saturday Morning

Renowned space environmentalist and astrodynamicist specialising in space object detection and identification, Dr Moriba Jah believes it's only a matter of time before someone is killed by falling space debris. Currently there are an estimated 27,000 objects bigger than a softball hurtling around the Earth's orbit, not to mention the millions of smaller fragments. And these numbers are only set to grow with 24,000 satellites set to launch in the next 10 years. Dr Jah is also the chief scientist for Privateer, a start-up co-founded by Apple's Steve Wozniak aiming to enable sustainable growth for the space sector. The company has mapped our crowded skies and used that data to create Wayfinder - a space junk tracker application available to the public.