Tiangong space station damaged by space debris strike, China working on clean-up

China’s Tiangong space station reportedly suffered a partial loss of power due to a space debris strike, state media reported. The incident took place during one of the spacewalks by astronauts of the Shenzhou 17 mission on March 1.

The space station, operated by China Manned Space Agency (CMSA), suffered a partial but minor loss of power supply after the outpost’s solar panels were damaged by space debris.

Even after experiencing glitches in the space station, spacewalks were a success, said CMSA on Wednesday in a press conference. The agency will look forward to guarding the space station from future space debris-related mishaps, reported Chinese state media.

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"The space station's core module Tianhe had suffered a partial loss of power supply due to the impact of the space debris on the solar wing's power cables," Xinhua news agency reported, paraphrasing CMSA deputy director Lin Xiqiang.

Though Xinhua did not specify if the debris was from micro-meteoroids or from human-made structures in space, both pose threats to permanently crewed space stations like Tiangong and the International Space Station (ISS).

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Many reports by NASA show that human-generated orbital space debris is growing and would be the next biggest challenge for space companies.

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) tracks more than 43,000 overall space objects as of April 2024, according to SpaceTrack.org.

There are more than 7500 active satellites in space right now, as per the Union for Concerned Scientists, most of them which are part of SpaceX’s giant Starlink network.

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Removing space debris is a difficult task. Instead, ISS controllers had to remove the space station out of the way of the debris. This is not an easy task either, as the guidelines for doing this are strict. A manoeuvre is mandated if any debris arrives in a "pizza box" roughly 2.5 miles by 30 miles by 30 miles (4 by 50 by 50 kilometres) with the ISS at the centre, according to agency officials.

With the help of NORAD, the ISS controllers have done this more than 30 times since its first modules launched in 1998.

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China's space station also has "executed manoeuvres on multiple occasions to evade space debris impacts", according to the Xinhua report, and Lin discussed several measures the CMSA is taking to prevent future issues.

"China has enhanced its capability to precisely forecast the orbits of the space station and small low-orbit targets, optimized the procedures for space collision warning and avoidance, and reduced the false alarm rate by 30%, according to Lin," Xinhua wrote, without revealing specifics.

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China is also planning to include more video-based scrutiny of Tiangong, like using a high-definition camera on its robotic arm and tasking the Shenzhou 18 crew to put in more reinforcements.

The Shenzhou 18 mission is scheduled to launch on April 25.

The crew of the mission will be tasked “with installing space debris protection reinforcements for extravehicular piping, cables and critical equipment during their extravehicular activities," Xinhua reported.

(With inputs from agencies)