Airbus is set to test a harpoon to trap defunct satellites and remove them from the sky.

Currently under development, the 1m-long projectile is designed to be attached to a ‘chase spacecraft’ by a strong tether, deployed to capture rouge satellites and other debris orbiting Earth.

The captured objects will burn up once they enter the Earth’s atmosphere.

The harpoon is expected to address the rising problem of the old spacecraft objects that continue to travel around the globe and pose a collision threat to operational satellites and astronauts.

Approximately 20,000 pieces of debris larger than 10cm are currently estimated to be orbiting the Earth.

“If we can design a harpoon that can cope with Envisat, then it should be able to cope with all other types of spacecraft.”

The new Airbus harpoon will have the capacity remove one of the biggest pieces of space debris, Envisat, a defunct European satellite.

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Weighing 8t, the Earth observation satellite died suddenly in orbit in 2012.

Airbus advanced project engineer Alastair Wayman was quoted by bbc.com as saying: “If we can design a harpoon that can cope with Envisat, then it should be able to cope with all other types of spacecraft, including the many rocket upper-stages that remain in orbit.”

Airbus is using its facility in Stevenage, UK, to test the harpoon. Testing includes firing the harpoon into a panel that features the types of material used to manufacture satellite structures.

Wayman further added: “The harpoon goes through these panels like a hot knife through butter.

“Once the tip is inside, it has a set of barbs that open up and stop the harpoon from coming back out. We’d then de-tumble the satellite with a tether on the other end.”

Next month, a miniature version of the harpoon is scheduled to be launched into space as part of a mission called RemoveDebris.