Satellites fly at 17,000 miles an hour, completing a trip around the Earth in just an hour and a half! But at these speeds, we have a new problem: space junk. Space junk includes satellites that don’t work anymore, floating leftover pieces from rocket boosters, tools dropped during astronaut walks, and so on. If you’re up there doing a space walk, grab some garbage to help us clean up!
Lace up: If you have 4 pieces of space junk, and 1 of them breaks in half, how many pieces do you have now?
Jog: If you’ve made 9 trips around Earth so far today, what number is your next trip?
Sprint: If you’ve made 9 trips around Earth so far today, how many more trips can you make today if you can make 16 trips in total?
Hurdle: If you start your orbit at 3:30 pm and the trip takes 1 1/2 hours, at what time will you finish?
High Jump: If there are 400 pieces of space junk in your path, and on each of your 16 trips today you scoop up 30 pieces, can you catch them all?
Pole Vault: If you start orbiting Earth today (May 24) and make 16 junk-collecting trips each day, on what date will you make your 100th orbit?
Answers:
Lace up: 5 pieces.
Jog: The 10th.
Sprint: 7 more trips.
Hurdle: At 5:00 pm.
High Jump: Yes! You’ll be able to catch 480 pieces.
Pole Vault: On May 30. You finish 16 trips today, and another 80 trips 5 days after today, which is May 29. That brings you to 96 trips, so the 100th trip happens on May 30.
