Think about a mini van. That’s about the size of some satellites, but a good reference point. Some space junk is bigger and a whole lot is smaller.
Ever been in an airplane and looked out the window? That’s 40,000 feet (about 7-8 miles). Could you see a mini van on the ground from that distance? Nope.
Low Earth orbit starts at about 150miles up. The diameter of Earth is almost 8,000 miles. So to get a full picture of the Earth you have to be far away, and all the objects orbiting Earth (except the moon) are infinitesimally small in comparison.
I think you’re really underestimating how big Earth and the space around it are, and how small those things are in comparison. Also for image satellites it might be more desirable to pick a lower orbit, where there’s less of this stuff in the way. On the off chance that something *is* in the way, they might discard the photo and get another one on the next pass.
Another thing is there are around 34,000 peice of space junk larger then 10 centimeter most of those are tracked and catalog.so we are not talking about the first stage of a Saturn V rocket we are talking here small pecies of things. Each one of these have an orbit that can be tracked and monitored. So say that you have a debris field of space junk at altitude 100 miles above the earth’s surface you would program you satellite to avoid that area. Spacecraft the pilot would do this. So first you are already avoiding the area that junk is in and then you want to take a picture of the earth’s surface you point the camera towards the earth and take the picture while having avoided ever being near the debris in the first place. There have been times when debris has been captured on film. Look up the black night satellite for a good read. Also the camera resolution along with lighting angle of the sun shadows might not be able to illuminate the debris near you. Hope that helps.
*edit due to spelling.
Answer this: “Why do images of Earth from space not contain trucks?”
Because they’re too small and spread out, right?
Except there are way more trucks than satellites, AND each truck is bigger too! So you’ve answered your own question. They’re smaller than a pixel in a pic that fits the whole earth.
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