These Two Startups Are Teaming Up to Prevent a ‘Pearl Harbor Moment’ in Space

Exclusive: Portal Space Systems and Paladin Space are partnering to launch a new service in low-Earth orbit. Here’s how it will work.

BY CHLOE AIELLO, REPORTER @CHLOBO_ILO

Photo: Portal x Paladin

In January, a Chinese spacecraft meant to carry three astronauts back to Earth from the Tiangong space station returned unmanned, but with a cracked window. The culprit? A piece of debris the size of a speck of dust had collided with the Shenzhou 20 capsule, creating small cracks in a window. In spite of the minuscule nature of the threat and its seemingly insignificant damage, Chinese officials ruled the aircraft was no longer safe enough to ferry the astronauts home.

While thankfully no one was injured—or killed—the incident reignited conversations about congestion in low Earth orbit and solutions that could mitigate the potentially catastrophic risk of space junk, as increasing numbers of commercial satellites from companies like SpaceX and Amazon pepper the region just beyond Earth’s atmosphere. 

Innovators are up to the challenge. The company behind a Tony Stark-like solution for moving satellites in orbit announced a new partnership on Thursday for collecting hazardous junk. Portal Space Systems, which is based in Washington state, is teaming up with Australian startup Paladin Space to launch a scalable, commercial space debris clean-up service. 

Through the partnership, Portal plans to bolt Paladin’s proprietary Triton debris capture and identification system to its maneuverable Starburst spacecraft. The two are targeting launch in early 2027, which Paladin founder Harrison Box notes is a “very quick period of time to get into market,” especially since he launched his Adelaide-based company in 2023. 

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Even so, Portal Space Systems cofounder and CEO Jeff Thornburg worries it won’t be fast enough to fight back against space debris that threatens everything from GPS satellites to spacecraft like the Shenzhou 20.

“We’ll be flying the first service missions in 2027 for this, and then growing them in 2028 and beyond,” says Thornburg, who is also a U.S. Air Force veteran and Tesla alum. “I just hope that we don’t have our Pearl Harbor moment before then.”

Paladin’s Triton system works a little something like a trash compactor. Although Box was hesitant to share too much about the patent-protected mechanism of action, he says the unit, which is a roughly one-meter-sized cube, contains doors that open to capture space debris and a robotic mechanism that secures it. Once the container is full, it can be ejected to safely burn up during re-entry to Earth’s atmosphere.

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