Japan Space Junk Collector Kounotori 6 burned up in the atmosphere without completing its junk collection mission. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency launched the remote spacecraft to clean space debris.

Thousands of space junk made up of dead satellites and the like, surround Earth at this moment. Japan's Kounotori 6 spacecraft was tasked with cleaning up some of these space junk.

According to New Scientist, the Kounotori 6 is equipped with a 700-meter long metallic cable. The remote spacecraft's cable aims to grab and dispose of space junk, but a technical glitch prevented the cable from even deploying.

Before the Japan space junk collector could fulfill its purpose, it eventually plummeted into Earth's atmosphere. The fall incinerated the Japanese spacecraft signaling a failed attempt in collecting space junk.

However, this is thought to be only the beginning when it comes to ridding the planet of space junk. The European Space Agency is apparently gearing to test their space junk collecting technology in the near future.

While the Japan Space Junk Collector experiment was not exactly successful, the journey of Kounotory 6 was not a complete waste. According to Space, the Kounotory 6 successfully unloaded five tons of water, food and even clothes to the space station back in December.

Meanwhile, Japan's space program efforts do not seem to be coming to a stop any time soon. According to UniverseToday, JAXA recently launched a military satellite into orbit. The DSN 2 is just one out of three planned defense communication satellites that Japan hopes to launch.

The launch of DSN 2 is an effort to aid the Japan Self-Defense Forces. The x-band relay satellite hopes to remove Japan's dependence on international communication providers.

This way, Japan's military can focus and utilize their resources given that all three planned satellites are in orbit. With its recent launch, Japan has become a force not only in the technology race but in the space race as well.