人类终于开始清理太空垃圾了 | 一周看点
人类终于开始清理太空垃圾了
人类所到之处都是一片狼藉，太空也不例外。
虽说太空很大，但地球周边的这块区域是有限的，现在这里已经漂浮了很多太空垃圾，而且都在高速移动，十分危险。现在，为了应对这个状况，人类史上的第一次太空垃圾清理工作开始了。
外媒报道
Today, our species is responsible for more than 500,000 pieces of junk hurtling around Earth at phenomenal speeds, and if we don’t start actively removing the largest pieces, the risk of collisions will only grow worse.
现在人类要为超过500,000个绕地球高速飞行的垃圾负责，如果我们再不积极行动起来清理大型垃圾，碰撞的危险只会越来越大。
“Imagine how dangerous sailing the high seas would be if all the ships ever lost in history were still drifting on top of the water,” says Jan Wörner, European Space Agency (ESA) director general.
欧洲航天局（ESA）局长Jan Wörner说：“想象一下如果曾经失踪的所有船只都漂浮在水面上，在公海航行会有多危险。”
“That is the current situation in orbit, and it cannot be allowed to continue.”
“目前轨道上就是这种情况，不能再任其继续发展了。”
It’s almost as if we need a tow truck to remove all the thousands of failed satellites from our orbit; incidentally, that’s exactly what the ESA is working on.
就好像我们需要一辆拖车把成千上万颗失灵的卫星拖离轨道。顺便说一句，这正是欧洲航天局正在研究的。
By 2025, the agency plans on launching the world's first orbiting junk collector, a four-armed robot that tracks down space waste like Pac-Man in a maze.
该机构计划到2025年发射世界上第一个轨道垃圾收集器，这个4条手臂的机器人就像迷宫里的吃豆子的人一样追踪太空垃圾。
The first-of-its-kind mission, known as ClearSpace-1, will start out small, collecting only a single piece of space junk to prove the concept works. The target in this case is called Vespa, a leftover remnant from ESA’s Vega rocket launch in 2013.
第一次这样的任务被称为ClearSpace-1（清理太空-1），先执行小任务，只收集单件的太空垃圾来证明这一概念的可行性。这一任务的目标是Vespa，是欧洲航天局2013年发射织女星火箭留下的残骸。
新西兰的冰川变成了红色
冰川能够是红色吗？反正新西兰的冰川现在变红了，铁锈那种红。
具体原因还没查清，但大家猜测和旁边澳大利亚的大火有关。
外媒报道
As the Southern Hemisphere enters summer, a catastrophic bushfire season is well underway on Australia’s east coast. Homes have been destroyed, koalas are dying, and there’s currently a thick smog of smoke blanketing parts of the state of New South Wales.
随着南半球进入夏季，澳大利亚东部海岸爆发灾难性的森林大火。房子被烧毁，考拉相继死去，目前浓烟笼罩着新南威尔士州部分地区。
Some think the effects of the extensive fires could even be travelling across the ocean, ending up on New Zealand’s glaciers.
一些人认为大面积火灾甚至会波及大洋彼岸，影响到新西兰的冰川。
Travel writer and photographer Liz Carlson took these beautiful and sad photos while on a helicopter tour in Mount Aspiring National Park in New Zealand’s South Island.
旅行作家兼摄影师Liz Carlson乘直升机在新西兰南岛的阿斯派灵山国家公园拍到了这些美丽而伤感的照片。
“It’s pretty remarkable to see the impact of the fires from so far away,” she wrote on her blog Young Adventuress.
她在她的博客《Young Adventuress》上写道：“真的是很不寻常，竟然在这么远的地方看到大火的影响。”
全球最大的印钞厂要破产了
全球最大的印钞公司De La Rue警告说对未来“很是担忧”，除非能扭亏为盈。
这家为全球多国印刷纸币和护照的公司就要没钱了。
外媒报道
De La Rue, which prints notes for the Bank of England and more than 100 other central banks, said it was suspending its dividend to help tackle mounting debts as it reported a first-half loss following a raft of problems.
De La Rue公司为英格兰银行和100多家其他中央银行印刷纸币，说正暂停派发股息以应对不断增长的债务，在遭遇一系列问题之后该公司报告了上半年的亏损。
Shares in the Basingstoke-based business plunged by a fifth to 140p, wiping £36m off its value, after it said there was “material uncertainty that casts significant doubt on the group’s ability to continue as a going concern.”
这家总部位于贝辛斯托克的公司股价暴跌五分之一，跌至140便士，市值蒸发3600万英镑。此前该公司说“真实存在的不确定性导致人们怀疑该公司继续经营的能力”。
The company, which employs more than 2,500 people globally, said the warning was based on a worst-case scenario.
这家公司在全球范围内有超过2,500名员工，基于最坏的情况发出了这一警告。
Unite, the union, said it was a “very worrying” development for workers at De La Rue, whose UK locations include Debden in Essex and Gateshead in the north-east.
工会Unite说De La Rue公司的员工前景“堪忧”，该公司在英国埃塞克斯的德布登和东北部的盖茨黑德都有分厂。
Airbnb进军办公楼领域
随着Airbnb满足了越来越多的住房需求，它现在也正在探索将业务范围扩大到度假租赁之外。
比如，他们现在要进军办公楼了，不过现阶段还不是自己运营，而是氪金投了一家这个领域的领跑者。
外媒报道
A marketplace for longer-term corporate housing could be a huge business, but rather than build that itself, Airbnb is making a strategic investment in one of the market leaders called Zeus Living, which will list its homes on the Airbnb site.
长期的办公用房市场会是一笔大买卖，但Airbnb不是自己建楼，而是对市场领导者Zeus Living进行战略投资，Zeus Living会将房子挂到Airbnb的网站上。
In just four years of redecorating landlords’ homes and renting them to relocated workers for 30-day stays (or longer), Zeus Living has grown to a $100 million revenue run rate.
Zeus Living将房东的房子重新装修，租给拆迁工人30天（或更长时间），仅仅四年收入就达到了1亿美元。
It boosted revenue 300% in 2019, and now has 250 employees and more than 2,000 homes under management.
2019年收入增加了300%，现有员工250人，管理住房2,000多套。
Zeus makes money by charging landlords one free month of usage, and marking up the rent charged to customers.
Zeus的营销方式是从房东那里获取一个月免费使用权，然后再向租户收取租金。
它可以把每月4000美元的房子以5000美元的价格租出去，再加上额外的一个月，一年就能赚16000美元。
Zeus CEO and co-founder Kulveer Taggar tells me, “I fundamentally believe that a lot of human potential is bound by location. At Zeus, we’re deeply committed to making it easier for people to live where opportunity takes them.” It’s already hosted 27,000 residents for a total of 650,000 nights.
Zeus首席执行官兼联合创始人库尔弗·塔格对我说：“我完全相信很多人的潜能受到了地理位置的限制。在Zeus，我们致力于让人们更容易地生活在有机会的地方。”该公司已有27,000名租户，共租住650,000晚。
