The UK Space Agency Competition Asked Britain to Name a Space Bin

On November 3, someone at the UK Space Agency typed up a cheerful post inviting the public to name Britain’s first space debris removal mission, and you could almost hear the rest of the country crack its knuckles. The UK Space Agency competition is real, it runs until December 10, and the winning name gets etched on the side of an actual spacecraft. The replies, naturally, went straight to Debris McGee.

For the record, the mission is serious and kind of amazing. It’s a world-first mission to clean up space, backed by more than £60 million, that will launch from Scotland in 2029 and use giant robotic claws to grab two dead satellites and send them down to burn up in the atmosphere. I can’t get my recycling to the curb on the right morning, and Britain is scheduling a pickup in orbit. That’s the comparison @sc0ttfb landed on, and I have not recovered.

Did the UK Space Agency Expect This?

It should have, because the sci-fi crowd arrived immediately. @DachshundColin, an account presenting itself as a dachshund named Colin, offered Obi Wan Cleanobi, which is better than anything I’ve produced at my job this year. Someone else pitched Mega Maid, the giant vacuum-cleaning robot from Spaceballs, a movie that apparently saw this exact mission coming and played it for laughs.

Red Dwarf got two votes that I could find. UK Defence Journal, a publication you’d assume had other things going on, replied with just the title of that British sci-fi sitcom, and Peter Hague followed up with a picture of Starbug, its lumpy green shuttle. Neither seems to be kidding, which is what I admire.

Britain Brought Its Own Mascots

This is where I, an American, needed a translator. Henry is a smiling red vacuum cleaner that apparently lives in every British closet, and @annemariesj insisted the spacecraft must have his face on it. Iron Chicken comes from The Clangers, a children’s show about knitted creatures in space, and WombleSat honors the Wombles, furry British kids’ characters whose whole job is picking up other people’s litter. A nation looked at an orbital debris program and thought of its childhood cleaning staff.

We Have All Been Here Before

Americans know this genre from Boaty McBoatface, the name that won a 2016 British poll for a polar research ship, only for the ship to get named after David Attenborough and Boaty to get an underwater vehicle as a consolation prize. So Spacey McSpaceface showed up right on schedule, and so did Spacey McSpaceBin. The Turdis and Debbie Does Debris are also in the running, and I’m going to let you work out those two on your own time.

One reply summed up the whole history of the problem: never ever ask the British to name a craft. It came with a picture of a Royal Air Force plane wearing a name I would love to hear read aloud over a control tower radio.

I’ll be honest, I find all of this kind of sweet. Whoever wins the UK Space Agency competition, the judges are going to read a lot of puns before December 10, and every one came from someone who stopped what they were doing to think about space junk for a minute. I can’t get people to reply to a group text about dinner. The UK Space Agency got a whole country brainstorming for its bins, and I’m a little jealous.

Still not done with Britain? Today’s Forecast for British Memes Is Overcast With a Strong Chance of Sarcasm is the natural next stop, Reading UK Memes Has Taught Me More About a Country Than Any Travel Documentary Ever Did fills in the cultural gaps, and 35 Funny Sci Fi Memes For Hyperspace Snort-Laughs is there for the Cleanobi crowd.