3 ms·
No, they burn up. You can think of how much work goes into the heat shields on spacecraft that are supposed to survive reentry. Satellites have none of that.
by oconnor663 3y ago
No, they burn up. You can think of how much work goes into the heat shields on spacecraft that are supposed to survive reentry. Satellites have none of that.
- scottlamb 3y agoI also think a screw at terminal velocity might not be particularly dangerous, similar to the popular "will a penny dropped off the empire skyscraper kill you?" question. ...which I suppose is closely related. The deorbiting satellite burns up because all that potential energy goes into heat because of the ~friction~ [edit: compression, thanks for the correction] that limits it to that low terminal velocity.
- iamgopal 3y agoHeat is Not because of friction but compression of air
- m4rtink 3y agoStarlinks are actually built so that nothing sizeable remains at all after reentry. This even delayed the laser coms a bit, as the original laser mirrors were too sturdy & so pieces of them could theoretically make it through.