A new orbital debris reference model

By simulating all the historical fragmentations in space, a new space debris environment model was produced and validated. The sources considered were 140 spacecraft and upper stages breakups and the liquid sodium-potassium coolant leaked from 16 Soviet radar ocean reconnaissance satellites. The resulting 1997.O CNUCE Orbital Debris Reference Model (CODRM-97) includes more than 52 millions of particles heavier than 1 mg.