The Air Force awarded a nearly $915-million contract to Lockheed Martin Corp. to monitor the vast junkyard of debris orbiting the Earth.

Millions of objects such as dead satellites, lost astronaut equipment and spent rocket stages from space missions within the last half century currently fly around the planet at great speeds, The Los Angeles Times reported.

Lockheed is tasked with developing a surveillance system called "Space Fence" that will watch over the Earth's atmosphere and allow the U.S. government to track such objects caught in Earth's gravitational pull.

In the past, efforts have been discussed among the global community to cleanup the space debris but experts said they need to know what objects are orbiting the planet as well as what sort of danger it can cause.

"Space Fence" would now equip the experts with a tool to track and identify much larger pieces of orbiting debris, Air Force officials said.

"Previously, the Air Force could only track and identify items the size of a basketball," said Dana Whalley, the government's program manager. "With the new system, we'll be able to identify items down to the size of a softball. This will significantly increase our capability."

The current system in place now is the Space Surveillance Network, a worldwide network of 25 space surveillance sensors that use radar and optical telescopes. The system has been in use since 1957 when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, The Lost Angeles Times reported.

Space Fence will be able to detect small objects in low-Earth orbit with its use of a higher wavelength frequency. Using continuous radar pulses to detect, track and determine the orbits of such objects, Space Fence essentially forms a pulse-field fence the objects would pass through.

The LA Times reported that researchers have cataloged only 23,000 items that are bigger than a basketball so far, but 1,100 of those were functioning spacecraft. NASA has estimated that there are several millions of pieces so small they can't even be tracked.

Several objects that are sometimes part of cloud of debris travel at speeds up to 17,500 mph, which can cause substantial damage to the International Space Station and satellites that are important to us down here.

Everything that is currently launched to space must be carefully calculated as to not collide with any of the orbiting debris. Even the smallest pieces such as paint flecks have caused nicks in space shuttles. Astronauts aboard the space station are sometimes forced to take shelter in an escape capsule when an orbiting cluster of debris is headed their way, according to The LA Times.

According to a 2007 National Research Council study, the amount of orbiting debris is at a "tipping point." What is burdening researchers is the possibility that the debris will continue colliding with each other and create a domino effect with a "collision cascade," similar to one depicted in the film "Gravity."

"I don't want to say that a Hollywood movie is a reflection of reality," Whalley said. "But they did do a good job of showing what a debris field looks like as it moves through space."

Lockheed will begin production on the system in six months on the island of Kwajalein Atoll, more than 2,400 miles southwest of Honolulu, and is expected to be operational by 2018.