Space Debris

Since the launch of Sputnik in 1957, roughly 6000 objects have collected in orbit around our planet. Some 800 of these are still operational, while the rest have become part of the ever growing space detritus, occasionally exploding or colliding with one another creating millions of pieces of debris zooming overhead at the rate of several miles per second. It has become a real concern, since even the tiniest fragment is enough to pierce the thickest armor of any space craft sent from earth. Various maps have been produced to assess the layout of these objects, the traceable ones are shown in the image below, as produced by NASA. Remember, we've only been putting these things in orbit for 50 years, and by the looks of it, we've already got quite the interplanetary sculpture garden.