What happens when a man-made satellite’s life has come to an end? Once it has completed its mission or stopped working, an out-of-action satelite becomes space debris, and can be a potential hazard to other satellites or spacecraft. That leaves us with two options, depending on how high it is.

Option one: engineers use its last bit of fuel to slow it down and let it burn up in the atmosphere like a shooting star. This works well for satellites closer to Earth. Option two: they send it to the "Graveyard Orbit," almost 200 miles farther away from Earth than the farthest active satellites.

Think of the Graveyard Orbit as a space tech retirement home in an orbit so high up, it's closer to the moon than to Earth.