The scenario in Gravity quite freakishly shows off the Kessler syndrome. In 2013, a Russian satellite was destroyed by a fragment of a Chinese satellite that had blown up six years earlier. The year before that, the ISS changed its orbit to keep out of the path of debris from the 2009 collision of a U.S. satellite and a Russian Kosmos satellite.

Needless to say, accidents in space do happen. And it is getting out of hand. So something has to be done with the estimated 100 million bits of man made space junk circling the planet. Japan will take the lead. Their plan: cast a big net into space.

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) will do just that. They developed a wire net nearly 1,000 feet long but just a foot wide. Once it unravels, the net will generate a magnetic field that will theoretically attract nearby space debris.

The growing cloud of space junk poses a real threat to hundreds of satellites in orbit. According to experts, there may be some 22,000 pieces of space debris over 4 inches in size. Any one of them could start a chain reaction that could take out Earth's entire communications system.

Jaxa hopes that the net will be able to scoop up random debris. Hopefully it works.

[SCMP]