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Speaker 1: New Zealand has accepted an invitation to join the US

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Speaker 1: lead multinational space initiative, Operation Olympic Defender. It's about defense,

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Speaker 1: it's about deterring what they call hostile actions in space.

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Speaker 1: The US, the UK, Canada and Australia all part of

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Speaker 1: the group. Judith Collins says, we'll deploy Defense Force liaison

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Speaker 1: officer to the US Space Command in Colorado for the

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Speaker 1: next two years. Doctor Maria Potza is a lawyer and

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Speaker 1: international space law expert, and she joins me this morning.

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Speaker 2: Good morning to you, Morena Ryan, how are you.

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Speaker 1: I'm very well. Thank you Tell me how serious the

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Speaker 1: threat is a defense threat from space or in space.

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Speaker 2: Look, there's always threats in space, but those threats tend

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Speaker 2: to be posed mainly by space debris, so as opposed

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Speaker 2: to the hostile nature that you speak of a little

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Speaker 2: bit earlier. Look, we don't have huge threats of that

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Speaker 2: nature to be terribly terribly concerned about. It is though,

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Speaker 2: the sustainability and space debris that we're seeing a rise

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Speaker 2: of that does make us a little bit more concerned

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Speaker 2: when we think about threats, because of course, if you've

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Speaker 2: got a lot of space debris in space, then you've

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Speaker 2: got a problem of accessing space. Now. NASA and there's

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Speaker 2: a couple of other organizations around the world do monitor

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Speaker 2: space debris particles, but we need to have clear pathways

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Speaker 2: to space and orders get assets up there for both

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Speaker 2: military purposes, commercial purposes, as well as human exploration. So

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Speaker 2: I'm hoping that that.

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Speaker 1: Helps a little bit, because that is what this is

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Speaker 1: focused with them, This is like rubbish collection.

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Speaker 2: Well, hopefully we'll get there soon. But the really important

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Speaker 2: thing about this program and us joining this program is

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Speaker 2: it's not just about safe, responsible, secure use of space.

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Speaker 2: It's about sustainable use of space and resilience of the

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Speaker 2: space structure. So it's much much more than just the

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Speaker 2: one idea.

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Speaker 1: Right, how many pieces of space her up there?

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Speaker 2: A good question. I have no idea, but there's a lot.

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Speaker 1: Someone told me it was more than more than half

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Speaker 1: a billion pieces. Would that all be from us, things

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Speaker 1: that we have put up there and that are flying around?

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Speaker 1: And how do you how do you go about cleaning

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Speaker 1: up space?

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Speaker 2: All? Right? Look, big, big complex questions. First of all,

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Speaker 2: because we know exactly I haven't had coffee yet, so

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Speaker 2: I'll do my best. Look, I wouldn't know exactly how

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Speaker 2: many pieces of space debrusy there are floating rut up

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Speaker 2: there because we've got something called the Kessler syndrome, and

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Speaker 2: that's whereby you've got one piece of space debris that

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Speaker 2: could collide with another piece of space debrary and cause

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Speaker 2: lots and lots of more space debrrisy, and it becomes

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Speaker 2: really hard to monitor that new space debrary because of

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Speaker 2: course most of us as are pointing at the Earth,

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Speaker 2: so we can make estimations and we can make an

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Speaker 2: estimate of trajectory of that new space debris and what

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Speaker 2: it might be and where it's heading to. But that's

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Speaker 2: why I say, I'm just not sure, because we may

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Speaker 2: have had lots of collision pieces and they may just

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Speaker 2: be floating up all around up there. Now. You said

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Speaker 2: about you asked a question about space junk and space

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Speaker 2: deb re collection. I know that there's quite a few

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Speaker 2: nations around the world looking at this. We've even got

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Speaker 2: a U N Organization committee who are looking at the

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Speaker 2: question of space ever, and yeah, we are looking at

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Speaker 2: organized you know, how how we com mitigate space every

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Speaker 2: I mean, don't have a crystal ball, but it's going

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Speaker 2: to happen.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess the thing is, if we can't clean

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Speaker 1: up the ocean, how can we clean up space?

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Speaker 2: These are all good questions, all good questions.

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Speaker 1: So the threat from other countries, you know, the defense three.

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Speaker 1: You're saying that that's not such a serious thing, like

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Speaker 1: people countries aren't trying at the moment to be able

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Speaker 1: to hit Earth from space or can they already?

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Speaker 2: Gosh, again, a lot of good questions there, whether or

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Speaker 2: not they have the capability to do so. I don't

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Speaker 2: think actually anyone knows. But what I will say is this,

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Speaker 2: our joining the program, the Olympic program, is not necessarily

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Speaker 2: a response to some imminent hostile threat that's happening at

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Speaker 2: the moment. What I'm getting at is our joining this

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Speaker 2: program is a really important step for New Zealand on

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Speaker 2: a range of issues, and Minister Collins has really got

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Speaker 2: us going in the right direction when you think about

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Speaker 2: how we are shirting ourselves on that space stage of

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Speaker 2: the Space Ferry nation.

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Speaker 1: Good to have it, good to be at the table

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Speaker 1: as things get underway. Doctor Maria Potts, So thank you

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Speaker 1: very much for your time this morning. Really appreciate it.

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Speaker 1: Sorry about the questions. Lawyer and international space law expert.

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Speaker 1: I don't know, because at Russia and China, what are

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Speaker 1: they doing up there? I imagine something, you know, they'll

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Speaker 1: be eyeing something, and are we worried about that? Do

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Speaker 1: you want to make sure that we're with our five

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Speaker 1: Eyurs partners up there making sure, you know, patrolling space

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Speaker 1: not only there with the hoover camming up the debris

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Speaker 1: that we've left up there, but also you know, protecting it.

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