The International Space Station (ISS) might sound like a fun place to be in and work at, but do bear in mind that plenty of things can go wrong, and it is not as though you can rush to the nearest hospital to get medical help if you are injured. In fact, the ISS has been in perilous situations before, since it had to change its trajectory numerous times over the years, in order to avoid collisions with space junk. Perhaps all of those avoidance policies can be thrown out of the window soon, since researchers from Japan’s Riken Computational Astrophysics Laboratory have come up with the idea of blasting dangerous space debris out of the sky using laser cannons.
Boy, it would be like a real life game of Asteroids, that is what it is. Apart from that, the person who decides to blast unwanted debris out of the way can also act as though he or she is piloting the Death Star, and is about to blow up planets that do not want to submit to the iron fisted rule of the Emperor. Ah, to let the imagination run wild!
It will not happen so soon, since installation has been scheduled to happen in a few years’ time, as this system will then boast of a 100,000-watt ultraviolet CAN laser that is capable of firing 10,000 pulses per second, sporting a range of approximately 60 miles.
Filed in . Read more about Science. Source: extremetech