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Starlink lost 40 satellites to a geomagnetic storm
- nikolay 5y agoWho's gonna clean after SpaceX' now? It's amazing that I'll get a $1,000 fine if I drop a small piece of garbage here in Irvine, but SpaceX can go away polluting the sky indefinitely without any responsibilities!
- bagels 5y agoThe constellation is self cleaning to some large degree because of their relatively low orbits. Satellites that die on final orbit have ~5 years before they've reentered on their own, and before they orbit raise right after launch, it can be as low as a couple weeks. These orbits were an intentional choice by SpaceX. One of intentional effects benefits is to not contribute to space junk concerns.
- nikolay 5y agoThat still leads to pollution though - and I'm not even mentioning the pollution from their launching!
- steve_adams_86 5y agoSpaceX is using their satellites to accomplish useful things for a lot of stakeholders. They also get special permission to allow their satellites to descend to the earth at EOL. These satellites stop orbiting quite quickly after they're no longer functional - they don't orbit indefinitely. Your litter in comparison would be a totally different kind of problem, and evidently, it is a problem at human scale. That's why there are fines.
- nikolay 5y agoWell, I'm talking about small litter like a banana peel, which lots of other Earth inhabitants will actually appreciate. Even if these satellites burn into the atmosphere, they still pollute with the fumes. Not to mention the pollution from the launch itself!
- nikolay 5y agoBy the way, regarding the littering - I've been doing something I call "distributed composting." For example, if I eat an apple outside of my home, I just throw the remains somewhere it won't be an eyesore, but where it will decompose in no time or better yet - feed some animals or insects. But if a city employees catches me throwing "the litter" into the bushes, they will give me a fine for "littering".
- mlindner 5y agoYou better try and fine the universe for dumping tens of thousands of micrometeroid debris into the atmosphere every day too!
- nikolay 5y agoWell, that's outside of our control - unlike Starlink's junk.
- mlindner 5y agoHow are you (or anyone) harmed by this junk in ways that the universe doesn't already harm you?
- nikolay 5y agoAsteroids enrich our planet with elements and the satellites are already made from existing ones. I'm never gonna use Starlink and not only because it's super pricey, but because the idea is just stupid.
- mlindner 5y ago> Asteroids enrich our planet with elements and the satellites are already made from existing ones. Well the elements from both arrive the same way. > I'm never gonna use Starlink and not only because it's super pricey, but because the idea is just stupid. It's cheaper and better than the competitors. If HughesNet and Viasat can serve customers, why can't Starlink and do it better and cheaper than either.
- nikolay 5y agoNot cheaper, no - SpaceX is doing a classical dumping and I'm not sure why the authorities are letting this fly! In general, Elon Musk got a lot of privileges from the government while acting as a Libertarian im words, not deeds! He is no hero!
- Goety 5y ago"geomagnetic storm"
- ummonk 5y agoI’m picturing an anthropomorphic Earth going “come back” and dragging the satellites out of orbit.
- bpodgursky 5y agoRough luck. Sounds like no real risk or huge loss though. Imagine any other company on earth losing 40 satellites at a time and shrugging it off. That would bankrupt most space companies (except for maybe Planet). SpaceX is really working at different orders of magnitude here.
- billfruit 5y agoMay be OneWeb too.
- Dylan16807 5y agoI think the correct comparison is losing one launch. Most companies could handle that fine. That's what insurance is for.
- fastball 5y agoHuh, I've never thought about insurance for stuff like this. Do you think this was covered?
- Dylan16807 5y agoIt would be tricky and expensive to insure so many of their own launches so I'd guess no.
- shagie 5y agoMy favorite story of satellite insurance is HGS-1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAS-22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAS-22 > However, a failure of the Blok DM-2M fourth stage left it stranded in a highly inclined (51.6°) and elliptical orbit, although still fully functional. It was declared a total loss by its insurers. > The satellite was transferred to Hughes Global Services Inc., which was then a subsidiary of Hughes Space and Communications, with an agreement to share any profits with the consortium of 27 insurers. > Edward Belbruno and Rex Ridenoure heard about the problem and proposed a 3–5 month low-energy transfer trajectory that would swing past the Moon and leave the satellite in geostationary orbit around the Earth. Hughes had no ability to track the satellite at such a distance and considered this trajectory concept unworkable. Instead, Hughes used an Apollo-style free-return trajectory that required only a few days to complete, a trajectory designed and subsequently patented by Hughes Chief Technologist Jerry Salvatore. This maneuver removed only 40° of orbital inclination and left the satellite in a geosynchronous orbit, whereas the Belbruno maneuver would have removed all 51° of inclination and left it in geostationary orbit. > ... > These operations consumed most of the satellite's propellant, but still much less than it would take to remove the inclination without the Moon-assist manoeuvres. With the remaining fuel, the satellite could be controlled as a geosynchronous satellite, with half the life of a normal satellite – a huge gain, considering that it had been declared a total loss. The satellite was then maneuvered to geosynchronous orbit at 158° West. This ended up being the first lunar mission involving a communications satellite and the first lunar mission from a non-government entity. Watching the orbit on the wikipedia page is wild.
- ldoughty 5y agoBoth apparently good for the future of space debris, and a publicity opportunity... Despite losing probably millions of dollars... Good job SpaceX.
- GregorBrandt 5y agoThe press release specifically states the satellites will de-orbit and burn up by design.
- ldoughty 5y agoyes, they turned a loss into publicity... while not harming future space operations... They turned a loss into a win-win, I think.
- HWR_14 5y agoThe press release states the same safety plan SpaceX has been stating. We'll get to see if it works (which I expect it to), but shouldn't assume it already has.
- Dylan16807 5y agoThe only reason they are lost is because they fell too far down. How could they possibly fail to deorbit?
- HWR_14 5y agoI fully expect they will. But I want to actually see it happen instead of just blindly regurgitating corporate statements that it won't be a worry in the near future.
- Dylan16807 5y ago> blindly regurgitating corporate statements Unlike a lot of their claims, this is basic physics. Why would you need to see it happen? Like, you didn't answer my question. It wasn't about what you expect. I asked how anything else could happen.
- AceJohnny2 5y agoDo we know what is the expected lifespan of a Starlink satellite? I wonder how well this event factored into their cost calculations, like is this a "once-a-decade" event that actually happens every couple years, or was it in-line with their actuaries?
- colechristensen 5y agoFive years design lifespan before deorbit.
- CuriousCosmic 5y agoThe current generation has a 5-7 year lifespan and after that they are to either naturally decay or manually deorbit. The next gen that is supposed to be deployed with starship provided things get off the ground is intended to stay in orbit for a decent bit longer since they are larger, more expensive satellites. In the grand scheme of things, this initial set is more a prototype than anything else so I doubt the loss will have any serious permanence. Now getting starship to production on the other hand will really be what makes or breaks the starlink program (as it won't even be possible to deploy v2 if they were to dedicate every possible falcon 9 launch towards just deploying sats).
- dkbrk 5y agoI think this loss it a bit more painful than you imply. Sure, they're prototypes, but these are the latest prototypes. They were probably equipped with laser links, and while 40 satellites is only a small fraction of the entire constellation, it would be a much more substantial fraction of the laser-equipped ones.
- pjscott 5y agoThis didn't affect satellites that were in their final LEO orbits; it affected part of a batch of newly launched satellites that were lower down, on their way up toward their final orbit, and therefore susceptible to the temporary thickening of the upper atmosphere. The effect on the lifespan of Starlink satellites is just to add slightly more "infant mortality" compared to a hypothetical world without geomagnetic storms -- 40 satellites is about 2% of the ones they've launched.
- mortenjorck 5y agoOf all press releases in recent memory, this is the one that reads the most like hard science fiction.
- platistocrates 5y agowhat's cool is, it doesn't even feel futuristic anymore.
- the_arun 5y agoSomeday potentially we could buy/lease/rent our own satelites over satelites.com use it for personal research, photography etc.,
- Johnythree 5y agoAmateur groups have been launching satellites for decades now...
- GekkePrutser 5y agoYou can already make your own and get it launched if you have enough money. Cubesat components are pretty much off the shelf except the payload. And launch costs are to the tune of 30k per kg or so. I'm sure a lot of overhead / integration is added but it's financially possible for the well-off :)
- hypertele-Xii 5y agoLaunching a satellite is already sub $100k. Technology both miniaturizes and industrializes at an exponential rate. Think about how small and cheap computers have become in the span of a hundred years, from "occupies a building and costs a fortune" to "fits in your pocket and everyone can afford one". Sputnik 1, the first satellite ever launched cost 33 billion 1985 US dollars. 45 years later, you can get a cubesat into orbit for $100k.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
- xoudini 5y agoLink to anchor: https://www.spacex.com/updates/index.html#sl-geostrom https://www.spacex.com/updates/index.html#sl-geostrom (sic)
- rkagerer 5y agoThanks, the submission should be updated to that link. Here's a snapshot for after that post eventually falls off: https://archive.ph/dxEAo https://archive.ph/dxEAo
- nine_k 5y ago40 satellites out of 49 launched by the rocket. Pretty heavy losses, but it's interesting that nearly 20% were spared, even though, or because, they fly in formation.
- bagels 5y agoIt's because they orbit raise in groups of 20 (typically). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIQr1UyhwWk&t=350s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIQr1UyhwWk&t=350s
- soheil 5y agoThe cost breakdown: 40 x $250k = $10m 1 falcon9 launch = $30m ------------------------ $40m https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2019/12/spacex-starlink-satellites-cost-well-below-500000-each-and-falcon-9-launches-less-than-30-million.html https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2019/12/spacex-starlink-satell...
- omni 5y agoThe Falcon 9 should be pro-rated since some of the mission payload survived. 40 x $250k = $10m 1 falcon9 launch * (40 / 49) = $24.5m ------------------------------------- $34.5m
- brianwawok 5y agoIsn’t that retail cost of launch? Since they own the spaceships it should be 1/2 or less of the retail price.
- soheil 5y agoThat's the money they would have made and since I assume they don't any marketing that'd be the total realized cost.
- ncallaway 5y agoThat would work if they had sold all of their capacity, but I think there's plenty of unfilled Falcon 9 capacity. I don't think every Starlink launch could be replaced by a paying customer.
- brianwawok 5y agoI don't think any would, it's all spare capacity.
- mannerheim 5y agoThere might be the opportunity cost of a doing a retail launch instead, but I would guess for the Starlink launches, if they weren't launching them they wouldn't be launching anything at all, so you're probably right.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- superfrogged 5y ago
- pixelpoet 5y agoVery interesting development, mainly that it posed no threat of causing a cascade of space debris since it's in such a low orbit. That feels like an important aspect for considering the acceptability of so many objects from one company/entity in orbit, especially considering the existing cost to astronomy. So we've heard from SpaceX about their LEO sats, but what about other ones further out?
- bee_rider 5y agoI believe the faster orbital decay was part of the reason for putting them so low (on top of the obvious latency advantages).
- mlindner 5y agoThe thing that's not being well conveyed to people here is the storm didn't cause any satellite failure. The storm caused an expansion of the atmosphere which prevented re-orientation and orbit raising. The satellites are still functioning fine.
- dmor 5y agoAtomos space tugs can’t happen soon enough! https://www.atomosspace.com/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIhO3rvMTx9QIV8RTUAR1YBAPHEAAYASAAEgJVSfD_BwE https://www.atomosspace.com/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIhO3rvMTx9QIV8...
- yabones 5y agoWhat's crazy to me is that 50 years ago, losing 40 satellites would have been a significant portion of all satellites ever launched. Today, it's a temporary setback for a company that launched nearly one thousand satellites last year.
- MegaButts 5y agoThat's part of the reason there's just so much junk flying around in orbit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome
- bufferoverflow 5y agoIf you read the article, SpaceX specifically designed the process to avoid orbiting junk.
- cogman10 5y agoYup, spacex stuff is all LEO. Without input it all crashes into the atmosphere in a few years (3 I believe)
- pishpash 5y agoAnd we inhale it all. (Yes, I know it's insignificant; all things start insignificantly.)
- dymk 5y agoJust wait until you learn just how much random space stuff enters Earth’s atmosphere in any 24 hour period
- jlmorton 5y agoWhen you consider the century-long global effort burning 2-3 billion gallons of oil every day to raise CO2 from 320ppm to 420ppm, you get a sense of the scale involved.
- oxplot 5y ago40 sats makes up about 2% of the current fleet - so a rounding error in cost and time. The important part of this news is how those 40 sats deorbit and leave no junk either in orbit or on earth.
- Victerius 5y agoSpaceX should build a satellite picker satellite to collect their dysfunctional Starlink satellites and bring them back on Earth. They could study their vulnerabilities and apply the lessons learned to shield future Starlink satellites against solar storms.
- oxplot 5y agoThey are building that - it’s called Starship and one of the configurations will be a cargo ship with a bay and an arm that can pick stuff up and bring them back.
- nmstoker 5y agoIt is not that the satellites were insufficiently shielded against solar storms, it's that the atmosphere was impacted and thus their tactic of low Earth orbit didn't work at this precise moment.
- HWR_14 5y agoThe press release implies that the issue is known. They entered a safe mode just after launch, and had not yet reached an orbit from which they were able to successfully leave safe mode.
- bagels 5y agoA complete waste of resources. Cheaper just to send more of them up there. They know what caused these to come down.
- mlindner 5y agoYou apparently did not read the article as the solar storm did not in fact knock out any satellites.
- nneonneo 5y ago> SpaceX deploys its satellites into these lower obits Unintentional pun on "orbits", perhaps? It's incredible to me that launching satellites is so easy now that a failure of 40 satellites can be tolerated. On the bright side, I guess this gave SpaceX a chance to talk about their debris-limiting strategy!
- geocrasher 5y agoI wonder who'll write their orbituary.
- Victerius 5y agoNew York Times Capital City, Earth – Satellite Starlink XB-4590 has shut down yesterday, February 8, 2132, following a geomagnetic storm that irreparably crippled its circuits. XB-4590 was 5 months old. It is survived by the 32,008 other active Starlink satellites orbiting the Earth. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk IV declined to comment for this article.
- jrockway 5y agoMy main takeaway here is that Elon Musk's grandson, "∑∫π²∞", decided he was tired of the escalating unicode name game and just named his kid Elon Musk IV.
- geocrasher 5y agoI have to wonder if anybody else lost satellites. Starlink is at an especially low orbit, so either they were really unlucky, or they have poor radiation shielding. [EDIT] OK I made the wrong assumption that this was due to radiation, but it was due to the atmosphere being 50% more dense than usual due to the storm, which led to failure of the satellites. This makes good sense. Next time I'll read TFA before I comment!
- loeg 5y agoIt was due to increased atmospheric drag, not a direction result of radiation.
- ncallaway 5y agoThe Starlink satellites are launched into a very low orbit, and raise to their final orbit. These satellites had just launched, and had not yet raised their orbit, so they were lower than the rest of the constellation. > SpaceX deploys its satellites into these lower obits so that in the very rare case any satellite does not pass initial system checkouts it will quickly be deorbited by atmospheric drag. ... > Unfortunately, the satellites deployed on Thursday were significantly impacted by a geomagnetic storm on Friday. So, while Starlink's final orbit is lower than (almost?) all other satellites, these satellites were even lower than that. I would be very surprised if any other satellites were effected.
- ortusdux 5y agoThis method of parking in a lower orbit is also why the trains of satellites are highly visible for a few weeks after launch. They extend their solar panels horizontally to minimize drag, which causes them to reflect the sun just after dusk and just before dawn. Once they reach their higher orbit they reorient their panels perpendicular to the earth, greatly lowering their apparent brightness.
- noahtallen 5y agoThe page says that they are deployed out of the ship at very low altitudes before they climb to their final orbit. So I think this only applies very early on in the deployment process and wouldn’t impact anyone else, or even existing deployed starlink satellites. They even describe why they start lower than normal in the article ;)
- oliv__ 5y agoSay what you want about Elon Musk but SpaceX is one of the most inspiring thing in the world to me. I recently drove down to Boca Chica beach to see the spaceships in person: you can get really close to them it's pretty wild, and honestly I think it was the most amazing man-made thing I've ever seen in my life
- Tempest1981 5y agoIs it possible to predict a geomagnetic storm, before launching?
- leeter 5y agoIt is, was, they were warned and launched anyway. I assume they calculated they could get through it and didn't. Live and learn. My guess is this was in budget an 'acceptable losses' to the constellation. Fun site to track this stuff: https://www.spaceweather.com/ https://www.spaceweather.com/
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Andys 5y agoWoah, I wonder how much atmospheric heating of earth these storms are causing. (A quick google of NASA suggests: it can be several gigawatt-hours of power from one event, even accounting for the bulk of it being radiated back into space.)
- brokenmachine 5y agoWonder if there's any way to capture that power?
- spullara 5y agoI thought that it was due to some kind of interference from the title but it is interesting that it turns out to be increased friction from the atmosphere.
- birdyrooster 5y agoI love how they have turned a failure into a success! So cool!
- fastball 5y agoYou mean into a PR success?
- birdyrooster 5y agoThey are so responsible, aren't you glad NASA is gone now?
- jay_kyburz 5y agoI have a genuine question, are we handing SpaceX a monopoly by allowing them to launch these satellites, or will competing companies be able to launch similar services? Will space be too cluttered for competition? (I'm guessing space is really big and that we can have _a lot_ of small satellites up there.)
- jetsnoc 5y agoCompeting companies are able to launch their own satellites. Amazon is launching Project Kuiper satellites as soon as Q4 2022.
- whatshisface 5y agoMonopolies are legal, anti-competitive practices performed to sustain monopolies are not (give or take that they are unenforced.)
- dmix 5y agoThere's already multiple competitors in late stages doing this style of satellite internet. SpaceX just got there first.
- sneak 5y agoSpaceX granted themselves the monopoly on these large scale constellations by being the first (and so far only) organization to develop (mostly from scratch!) reusable orbital rocket stages. Anyone else (without Falcon 9) launching the same number of launches/satellites would spend several large multiples of the amount SpaceX did, which makes it economically infeasible. There will be other reusable orbital launch systems (although it looks like #2 will also probably be SpaceX, heh) but until that time everyone else is priced out of doing what SpaceX is doing. It's got some analogs with TSMC and the latest process size microprocessors. Nobody else is prevented from doing it as well... it's just that they figured it out first and nobody else has developed equivalent technology yet.
- mabbo 5y agoWe didn't hand them anything. SpaceX took the risk of being a first mover in a very difficult field and looks to have had their bet pay off. There's room for more satellites. Space is pretty big, and with some careful automated coordination we can avoid collisions. But someone else needs to first figure out how to cheaply launch a competing fleet, and I doubt anyone will come close for years.
- locusm 5y agoQueue the Joe Rogan episode where we find out what "really" happened.
- Shank 5y agoSo…we have the Space Weather Prediction Center [0] and raw data from NOAA for this exact purpose. Does SpaceX not review the data / warnings before launch? There was a G1 warning posted until 21:00 UTC on the launch date: Space Weather Message Code: WARK05 Serial Number: 1635 Issue Time: 2022 Feb 03 1428 UTC EXTENDED WARNING: Geomagnetic K-index of 5 expected Extension to Serial Number: 1634 Valid From: 2022 Feb 03 0555 UTC Now Valid Until: 2022 Feb 03 2100 UTC Warning Condition: Persistence [0]: https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/homepage https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/homepage (Warning citation: search for the serial on the warnings and watches page: https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/alerts-watches-and-warnings https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/alerts-watches-and-warnin...)
- wilg 5y ago"Does SpaceX not review the data / warnings before launch?" is peak Hacker News pettiness. Try not to assume the worst, especially when it's pretty silly.
- Shank 5y ago> Try not to assume the worst, especially when it's pretty silly. I'm just asking questions -- I would be genuinely curious if SpaceX has a system for determining and evaluating risk when it comes to a situation like this. It does seem absurd that they wouldn't review the active warnings prior to launches. What is indisputable here is that they've announced the loss of 40 satellites during an active warning. I think it's valid to wonder what the criteria is for a launch, given that the cost of the launch + payloads is quite high, and the cost of delaying the launch is (relatively) low.
- pigscantfly 5y agoCertain people high up in the org get irritable over launch delays. Sometimes others think the risk isn't worth the yelling and go ahead in less than perfect conditions.
- pugworthy 5y ago
- joering2 5y agoI recently started researching into Starlink as my next (cheap) internet solution and stumbled upon these 2 videos below. The worst part for me is that once this becomes more popular the bandwidth will die down to crumble. I don't buy they will be able to upkeep with bandwidth sharing it from satellite to satellite using a.. laser beam (is that even possible to sync 2 satellites and send signal thru laser beam that has radius of 10 nm at distance of 1,000 km from one object to another traveling at 20,000km/s ?) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaUCDZ9d09Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaUCDZ9d09Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vuMzGhc1cg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vuMzGhc1cg
- icodestuff 5y agoFirst video, once you skip the first 17 minutes which have nothing at all to do with Starlink, is based on two premises: 1. That on-orbit and orbit-to-surface bandwidth will never increase, and 2. That the prototype receivers are the final receivers. 2 has already been proven false with the second generation receiver, and there's no reason to assume that, with so much of the fleet getting replaced every decade, that the network bandwidth will be forever so limited. I don't think laser link tracking is terribly difficult on-orbit, particularly among satellites that share one. It's also considerably slower than stated, falling at 7.2-7.9km/s, not 20,000km/s.
- KiwiJohnno 5y agoI don't know anything about Common Sense Skeptic but Thunderf00t has a well known hate of Elon musk and tries to trash pretty much everything he does. I watched a bit of the Common Sense Skeptic video and heard several completely incorrect claims in the first couple of minutes. It not even remotely close to an impartial look at starlink. Just for a start, they can't use the list cost for falcon 9 launches as the internal cost to SpaceX, and then add in estimated SpaceX costs such as employee salaries. And as for laser interconnects between starlink satellites - Its already happening. The last few launches have been starlink sats that utilize these laser interconnects.
- kortex 5y agoThunderf00t is such a strange fellow. He's clearly quite bright and has some fantastic takedowns of pseudoscience and scammy things, and even disproves a claim about dipoles from a Veritasium video. But then he goes off with these screeds like the Starlink one as if like they are going to scale up v0.5 without any revision or cost improvement. In the name of "skepticism" or "rationality". But a real rational look at the situation would maybe give the ops and biz folks at SpaceX a bit more benefit of the doubt that they can project out profit/loss over multiyear timeframes.
- cyounkins 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_storm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_storm
- DrBoring 5y agoWill we be able to see the deorbiting satellites as shooting stars?
- TaylorAlexander 5y agoIt must be noted that the satellites were not directly damaged by the geomagnetic storm. The storm warmed the atmosphere which caused it to expand, leading to additional drag that prohibited the satellites from leaving their low "safe mode" orbit. Shortened excerpt: "These storms cause the atmosphere to warm and atmospheric density at our low deployment altitudes to increase.... speed and severity of the storm caused atmospheric drag to increase up to 50 percent.... The Starlink team commanded the satellites into a safe-mode where they would fly edge-on (like a sheet of paper) to minimize drag... Preliminary analysis show the increased drag at the low altitudes prevented the satellites from leaving safe-mode to begin orbit raising maneuvers, and up to 40 of the satellites will reenter or already have reentered the Earth’s atmosphere. The deorbiting satellites pose zero collision risk with other satellites and by design demise upon atmospheric reentry—meaning no orbital debris is created and no satellite parts hit the ground."
- blackhaz 5y agoExcept for a shower of heavy metal particles. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-89909-7.pdf https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-89909-7.pdf
- pfdietz 5y ago"mostly aluminum" Aluminum is not a "heavy metal". Not only is it of low density, it's not toxic in the way actual heavy metals like lead are. Your inclusion of the adjective "heavy" was misleading as that wasn't in the source you referenced.
- Chris2048 5y agoMaybe they meant "heavy, metal particles", as in that are both metal and "heavy" relative to other materials (so somewhat redundant adjectives); as opposed to, "heavy-metal particles".
- adrian_b 5y agoWhat you say is correct. I just want to add that the term "heavy metal" associated with toxicity is not really a good choice, even if it has been used for a long time. The so called toxic "heavy metals" are not toxic because they are heavy. They are toxic because their ions have a large size (when compared with metals like magnesium or iron). The large size of their ions makes them interfere with the functions of the ions having a similar large size and which have important uses in all living beings, i.e. calcium or potassium or ammonium or sodium. Large ionic size is also associated with good solubility, which enhances the chances of those ions to be absorbed after ingestion and enter living cells. "Metals with large ions" is longer and more inconvenient to say than "heavy metals", but it would be much more accurate. Saying "heavy" does not make you understand why e.g. cadmium (same ionic size as calcium) is very toxic, while indium and tin, which are heavier (but which have smaller ions), have low toxicity.
- mmaunder 5y agoSeems like a great way to test the resilience of Starlink launches during a predicted geomagnetic storm. And great PR considering how much negative press they’ve been getting over space junk. https://www.google.com/search?q=starlink+space+junk&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS890US890&hl=en-US&prmd=nsvxi&source=lnms&tbm=nws&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjEuZG73PH1AhVRFTQIHdVcAV0Q_AUoAXoECAIQAQ&biw=428&bih=751&dpr=3 https://www.google.com/search?q=starlink+space+junk&rlz=1CDG...
- mlindner 5y agoThe negative press is rather interesting and I'm always wondering where it's coming from. Why generate so much negative press.
- modo_mario 5y agoPeople don't like the prospect of issues in certain orbits for the benefit of a billionaire or research satellites getting destroyed or worse if stuff does ever go wrong. If Europes ESA and china's CNSA both complain about having to do manoeuvrers it's easy to see who most will side with.
- TaylorAlexander 5y agoAny time Musk comes up on twitter people are quick to hate him. He is a polarizing figure and while there are reasons to criticize him, there are also a lot of people who will happily misinterpret anything so they can perceive him as failing. So any negative story about Musk, correct or not, is emotionally satisfying to those people. Basically the stories come out because the crowd eats them up.
- mlindner 5y agoWhich is sad because if you were to limit choices to picking individual people on the planet, I think Musk may be doing more to fix real existential problems in the world more than anyone else alive today. People are jealous creatures and like to hate on successful people.
- leoh 5y agoIs anyone else concerned by their statement? i.e. in spite serious engineering efforts to ensure satellites function+orbit or nonfunction+deorbit, they don’t assert or furnish a way of understanding (today or at some future date), that of the 49 satellites: * how many are functional+orbiting * how many are nonfunctional+orbiting (i.e. space junk) * how many are nonfunctional+deorbit(ing|ed)
- Armisael16 5y agoNo. None are space junk and none were made nonfunctional by the storm. 1. The storm caused the atmosphere to expand 2. which increases drag on satellites. 3. The satellites were in safe mode because of the storm, so… 4. some satellites fell out of orbit because they couldn’t produce enough thrust to recover after the storm No satellite was ever even at risk of becoming space junk. This is pretty read TFA stuff.
- leoh 5y agoIs there any way they are being held accountable/is there open data to support assertions of the article in question?
- Armisael16 5y agoThis is also fairly well-known physics. We know what the atmosphere is like at those altitudes and we know what a starlink satellite looks like. Anything that sits around there is going to fall out of orbit pretty fast unless it has active thrust. Several governments have space-object tracking systems that work on stuff far smaller than starlink satellites - the US, the EU, Russia, probably China. I doubt that’s open enough for you, though. Frankly it doesn’t seem to me like there much to hold spacex accountable for. They’re out ~$35mm, but it’s harmless to the rest of us.
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- dchasson 5y agoA reminder that space weather affects years of human efforts not just the satellites we launch now. I hope that there is much to learn from 40 failures.
- praveen9920 5y agoWondering if they have insurance providers for satellites in orbit. Even with the limited lifetime, low earth satellites provide lot of value to company. With high risk that entails, it may not make sense now even with high premium but it might be a thing of future
- mlindner 5y agoThe title misrepresents things (people are posting this everywhere with this wrong title). The satellites were not lost to the geomagnetic storm. They were lost to the atmosphere expanding from the geomagnetic storm. The title implies some kind of electronic damage from the geomagnetic storm when in fact there has been none.
- lostlogin 5y agoWhen my garage flooded during a storm, can I blame the storm?
- TaylorAlexander 5y agoSure. The issue is that there is a way of interpreting this headline that the satellites can be easily damaged by electromagnetic storms. But actually these satellites were only vulnerable because they had not achieved their normal orbit and the thing that affected them was the atmosphere, not the radiation. People could assume the whole constellation could be easily damaged, but that is not implied by this scenario.
- mlindner 5y ago> When my garage flooded during a storm, can I blame the storm? Not a very good analogy. It's more like trying lay the blame for killing a piece of electronics on lightning that hit a mile from your house when in fact it was flooded by the rain.
- jsmo 5y ago"This unique situation demonstrates the great lengths the Starlink team has gone to ensure the system is on the leading edge of on-orbit debris mitigation."
- McHankHenry 5y agoWill they reenter the atmosphere and burn up, or remain as space-debris? Some are even saying they were space-debris the moment they were launched, due to SpaceX's lack of concern for other satellites up there.
- LeoPanthera 5y agoThey have already burned up. The storm caused increased drag on the satellites before they could boost their orbit. This is by design, specifically to avoid space debris. It does explain all this in the article.
- samwillis 5y agoI wander if Starlink launches are more susceptible to this than a normal launch with a single satellite? With there being a higher ratio of launched objects surface area to kinetic energy, I would assume they experience a higher effect of drag. It’s a bit like the difference between a shot gun and a rifle, both release a similar amount of energy but the shotgun shot has a much higher surface area and experiences more drag. (Not a physicist, probably missing something)
- rklaehn 5y agoYes. SpaceX intentionally launches the sats into an extremely low orbit. That way, sats that can not be controlled due to a manufacturing defect or whatever will immediately reenter, and pose no threat to other spacecraft. Normal satellites are directly launched into much higher orbits, so if there is an issue they will be space debris for decades.
- samwillis 5y agoYes, I understand they are injected to a particularly low orbit. My question is, if you launched a single larger satellite into the same orbit would it be less susceptible to aerodynamic drag due to the effects of a similar geomagnetic storm?
- noitpmeder 5y agoIf by "larger" you mean larger surface area (and therefore more drag) then I'd think yes. But not necessarily "larger" in terms of mass, if only because it could still have a fairly good aerodynamic profile.
- rklaehn 5y agoWhat is relevant is the sectional density, so how many kg you have per square meter, in SI units. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sectional_density https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sectional_density A single larger sat would usually have a higher sectional density. But as far as I am aware, nobody else is launching into such low initial orbits, no matter the size of the sat. Usually you want to launch into an at least somewhat stable orbit so you have some time for troubleshooting in case something goes wrong.
- Reventlov 5y agoWhat would be the physical mechanisms that would increase density / drag with an increase in the temperature ?
- modeless 5y agoAir expands when warmer, so the atmosphere increases in size and extends further into space where it hits the satellites in low orbit.
- danuker 5y agoI can mention thermal expansion. I don't know any others. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_expansion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_expansion
- albybisy 5y agocould these orbital debris hit commercial airplanes during the flight?
- rmbyrro 5y agoNow do the Russians and Chinese mitigate space debries in a similar fashion? I have the impression they don't care much (might be wrong?), and if not, why so? Not technically capable (I don't buy it)?
- Havoc 5y agoThe "mitigation" in this case largely comes down to it being a low orbit, rather than spacex doing something special. So yeah if other countries build low orbit networks the same will apply. ...the higher up orbits are more problematic
- Havoc 5y agoSeems like good timing at least. Enough sats up there so that it doesn't ruin the entire system, yet early enough for learning and improving future ones
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoEveryone here understands that when a geomagnetic storm starts knocking out satellites, that means we're now actually in the SyFy movie that we've only just survived the prequel for, right?
- Kye 5y agoIt's only an issue here because the satellites fly so low that they could be closer than the equivalent node in a land-based link and they're designed to sacrifice themselves rather than risk causing problems. They can replace all of these with one launch. The science fiction you're thinking of assumes satellites are difficult to make, expensive to replace, and create a hazard when they fail. That will become less of an issue in time. Even the expensive ones could have a temporary equivalent launched to cover their function while a new long-term satellite is built.
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoI think the science fiction stuff I'm thinking of assumes the audience just wants to see a story about one broken family succeeding against personal and scientific odds to save the solar system with one small device that has been stored in a shed somewhere on a ranch in Oregon by a scientist who continued to do his work after his project was hijacked by the military. ;-)
- ineedasername 5y agoI think I've seen that movie at least a dozen times. Strange thing though, they keep changing the name.
- DitheringIdiot 5y agoI thought the purpose of the low orbits was to lower latency. To make the internet usable. Other satellite internet has much longer latency because of the distance the signals need to travel. Are they saying the satellites start out lower and then go higher later?
- gvb 5y agoYes. They state "the low deployment altitude requires more capable satellites at a considerable cost to us" - the extra cost is in the extra fuel required to raise the satellite's orbit - this results in less fuel available for maintaining the satellite's orbit and thus a shorter lifetime.
- jelder 5y agoThe "higher" altitude is still quite low compared to most of the existing satellite internet providers.
- NelsonMinar 5y agoCurrent Starlink satellites operate at 550km. They launch them to 210km. The linked post talks about this in detail.
- 6d6b73 5y agoPrediction: Elon/SpaceX will cause major damage to space exploration and astronomy before 2025
- MaxDPS 5y ago> The deorbiting satellites pose zero collision risk with other satellites and by design demise upon atmospheric reentry—meaning no orbital debris is created and no satellite parts hit the ground. This unique situation demonstrates the great lengths the Starlink team has gone to ensure the system is on the leading edge of on-orbit debris mitigation. Kinda strange to make your prediction on this story.
- NelsonMinar 5y agoHere's a link to the storm report: https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/archive/2022/02/04/kp.html https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/archive/2022/02/04/kp.ht...
- therealbilly 5y agoSounds like an expensive situation.
- michaelmior 5y ago> "…meaning no orbital debris is created and no satellite parts hit the ground." How is this possible? Maybe I'm missing something, but the satellite parts have to go somewhere
- ineedasername 5y agoBurned up on entry, rendered down to heat, gas, and ash. Debris would usually be considered chunks of the original, so ash doesn't count. In this context it also means none of that is left in orbit either, which may be the more significant advantage of their procedures.
- michaelmior 5y agoThat makes sense. The forces involved are just mindblowing that it would be sufficient to make this happen.
- ineedasername 5y agoYes, agreed. Getting off the planet is easy. Staying off the planet is harder. As long as you're in the gravity well you are going to crash back down. The trick is to move so fast horizontally that you overshoot your target and keep missing the ground. (I'm pretty sure "miss the ground" is the scientifically accurate term here) Anyway, those speeds are so fast that once you get on course to finally not miss, the friction from even the extremely thin atmosphere, at those speeds, is incredible.
- Gareth321 5y agoThey burn up.