The mass of a bullet is more like 5 grams, and the mass of a satellite could be around 500,000 kg (the ISS). A quick search shows the the largest commercial communications satellite is Telstar 19V, with a mass of 7,076kg; in my first estimate I guessed 50,000kg. Finally, the closing velocity of two objects in orbit could be up to 22.4 km/s.
rifle bullet: 3×10³ J
Telstar 19V, geostationary orbit: 3.3×10¹⁰ J
Telstar 19V, geostationary transfer orbit: 3.5×10¹¹ J
ISS, LEO: 1.2×10¹³ J
hypothetical fast ISS: 1.1×10¹⁴ J
14−3 gives 11 orders of magnitude, but good luck making the ISS go that fast. Also, don’t forget to add in the kinetic energy of the net; it’s not going to be zero.
Still, even 7 orders of magnitude qualifies as ”quite a few”. You don’t need very many orders of magnitude before you have too many.
Forgive me for contradicting you, but I didn’t change anything; I just typed momentum when I meant energy. I first thought of the formula, not the name, and then typed the wrong name. I'm not sure how I made such a mistake, but mea culpa. Also my old friend bzbarsky mentioned closing velocity, and I stuck with it when I made my estimate.
I do agree that the ISS is not usually considered to be a communications satellite (though it does have plenty of communications gear on board, including a ham radio repeater if I recall correctly). But it is a thing that we might want to deorbit one day. Since we were considering the ridiculous closing velocity of two objects that are both on escape trajectories, I figure using the ridiculous mass of the ISS was fair game too. But like I said, I originally guessed 50t, not 400t. I was thinking more about the payload capacities of launch vehicles than the satellites themselves.
Whatever mass and closing velocity you consider, 7 or 10 or 11 orders of magnitude all qualify as “quite a few” even if the velocity itself only has 1.3 orders of magnitude of difference.
The mass of a bullet is more like 5 grams, and the mass of a satellite could be around 500,000 kg (the ISS). A quick search shows the the largest commercial communications satellite is Telstar 19V, with a mass of 7,076kg; in my first estimate I guessed 50,000kg. Finally, the closing velocity of two objects in orbit could be up to 22.4 km/s.
rifle bullet: 3×10³ J
Telstar 19V, geostationary orbit: 3.3×10¹⁰ J
Telstar 19V, geostationary transfer orbit: 3.5×10¹¹ J
ISS, LEO: 1.2×10¹³ J
hypothetical fast ISS: 1.1×10¹⁴ J
14−3 gives 11 orders of magnitude, but good luck making the ISS go that fast. Also, don’t forget to add in the kinetic energy of the net; it’s not going to be zero.
Still, even 7 orders of magnitude qualifies as ”quite a few”. You don’t need very many orders of magnitude before you have too many.