I wonder if there is a similar vid of launches at Boca Chica and Vandenberg. Vandenberg might not have that many, as I think it is used for launching polar orbits for some reason. It could be cool to see a time synced patchwork vid of all SpaceX launches!
Also, those with good behavior are deorbiting their debris. So, when a rocket segment or whatever becomes useless in space it is slowed so it will be consumed on reentry. Of course, that's relatively new (so lots of existing garbage) and not all countries follow that principle. And, there are some very serious offenders.
At the massive speed space junk is moving at shouldn't just the abrasion from the velocity alone eventually deteriorate the junk? Not to mention any other debris it may collide with
True. As far as I know, anyway. Obviously not good behavior. Not nearly as bad as those countries that have tested their ability to destroy their own satellites by impactors that spewed the refuse across the orbits.
That is the problem, not the solution. Something may collide with the space junk breaking it up into many pieces. Now we have many pieces all of which could collide with operational satellites and damage or destroy them. Even worse, some of the bits are too small to track. The collisions themselves on average would not lower the orbit. Eventually, if nothing is done, low earth orbit will be so full of junk it will be unusable.
I don't know if this answers your question but in lower earth orbit there is a very thin atmosphere. It slows things down enough that they spiral into the atmosphere over time and burn up. SpaceX satellites, for example are there.
I would add to this that the junk is then replaced by junk from higher orbits. The only solution is to remove the large pieces from higher up before they break up.
Those in high orbit are likely to stay there for a very long time some for thousands of years. Plus, the circumference of those orbits is enormous, meaning that there is very little density of objects. I don't believe that's the risky part. The real problem is in the altitudes where objects stay for many years, there are many thousands of objects and the altitude is highly useful. Cleaning out those altitudes would cost many billions, as each hammer or hunk of metal would need to be addressed individually. Plus, we need international agreement on every launch including a mechanism to deorbit the payload when its no longer useful. AND, it can NOT be allowed to have countries like India and China practice shooting at these objects, thus breaking then into whole clouds of super fast projectiles.
