Enlarge / Astroscale's ADRAS-J spacecraft captured these views of the H-IIA rocket upper stage on July 15. (credit: Astroscale) There are more than 2,000 mostly intact dead rockets circling the Earth, but until this year, no one ever launched a satellite to go see what one looked like after many years of tumbling around the planet. In February, a Japanese company named Astroscale sent a small satellite into low-Earth orbit on top of a Rocket Lab launcher.