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China Strikes Hard: Chinese Satellite Pulverizes Starlink with a 2-Watt Laser
- AnimalMuppet 1y ago"Pulverizes". I know that's what the actual headline says, but it is very misleading. No Starlink satellites were harmed in this experiment. What they actually did is, they moved data much faster than a Starlink satellite does, using a laser. Well, that's an achievement. Really, it is. They got it to transmit data, through Earth's atmosphere and the turbulence that it contains, at 1 Gb/s. That's amazing. I bet Starlink can handle more ground stations at once, though. And I bet Starlink does better on a cloudy day. So, while this is interesting, and a great achievement, I'm not sure it's a game changer yet. Others who know more can feel free to correct me...
- ben_w 1y agoThanks for the summary. From the headline, I'd assumed someone had disabled a satellite, and was thinking "is this headline mixing watts and kilowatts, or is Starlink just that fragile?" The reality is much less dramatic, and therefore also much less likely to start a shooting war, so that's good.
- gnabgib 1y agoThe satellite achieved 5x the speed of Starlink.. no destruction included. Chinese satellite achieves 5x Starlink speed with 2-watt laser from 36Mm orbit (4 points, 2 days ago) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44357846 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44357846