SpaceX’s Starlink Satellites Blamed For More Than 50% Close Encounters In Orbit
Image via Thomas Dutour / Shutterstock.com
Starlink, founded by SpaceX and Tesla mogul Elon Musk, uses a satellite internet constellation in low orbit to provide wireless internet to customers. However, it appears that the company’s satellites are involved in nearly 1,600 near-misses between two spacecraft every week.
According to Hugh Lewis, Head of the Astronautics Research Group at the University of Southampton, these near-misses account for situations when two spacecraft pass within 0.6 miles of each other. Lewis made the estimate based on data from the Socrates (Satellite Orbital Conjunction Reports Assessing Threatening Encounters in Space) database.
“I have looked at the data going back to May 2019 when Starlink was first launched to understand the burden of these mega-constellations. Since then, the number of encounters picked up by the Socrates database has more than doubled, and now we are in a situation where Starlink accounts for half of all encounters,” Lewis told Space.com.
Notably, the 1,600 encounters only include those between two Starlink satellites. In addition, there are still 500 instances every week in which the company’s internet satellites come close to other operators’ spacecraft.
When compared with its competitor, OneWeb, Lewis said the company’s 250 satellites are involved in approximately 80 close encounters every week.
Unfortunately, the problem is expected to get worse. So far, only 1,700 Starlink satellites have been placed into orbit. When the firm manages to launch all 12,000 of its planned satellite constellation, Lewis’ calculations suggest its satellites will be involved in 90% of all near-misses.
Thankfully, despite the overwhelming number of close approaches, only three confirmed collisions have been recorded so far. According to Space.com, earlier this week, satellite tracker Jonathan McDowell, based at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, found evidence that a Chinese meteorological satellite had hit a piece of space debris.
Back in 2009, the worst space collision in history occurred when a US telecommunication satellite Iridium 33 crashed into Russia’s defunct military satellit4e Kosmos-2251 at an altitude of 490 miles. This collision resulted in over 1,000 pieces of debris larger than four inches being launched into space, which led to further incidents with other spacecraft.
Lewis said he feared the growing number of near-misses would increase the chances of an operator making the wrong decision. Avoidance maneuvers are not always taken up, as they incur costs for the company.
“In a situation when you are receiving alerts on a daily basis, you can’t maneuver for everything. The maneuvers use propellant, the satellite cannot provide service. So there must be some threshold. But that means you are accepting a certain amount of risk. The problem is that at some point, you are likely to make the wrong decision,” he explained.
Will Starlink be able to cope with the challenge of taking care of so many satellites in orbit, with the number only set to grow each year?
“They were a launch provider before, now they are the world’s biggest satellite operator, but they have only been doing that for two years so there is a certain amount of inexperience,” concluded Lewis.
[via Space, cover image via Thomas Dutour / Shutterstock.com]
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