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SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

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Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#91

Post by Swenrekcah »

dahdum wrote: post #88
optimiz3 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are we then saying there's an equivalent of domain squatting in space? Cause I could see all types of problems showing up if we call that common courtesy.

Domain squatting is on unused domains while this was an active public weather satellite already on an established orbit. Not at all comparable.

But the implication is then someone will launch a million tiny satellites doing nothing and occupy a million orbits.

That said, this was in my opinion very bad form for SpaceX, to the point I wonder if, as hinted in the article, they simply can’t do collision avoidance properly.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#92

Post by Invictus0 »

dahdum wrote: post #75
avocado4 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Either way, it exposes a flaw in SpaceX’s design What is this statement based on? You are saying yourself that there's no information available to the public about this due to lack of transparency, yet in the next sentence you are making a bold statement about design flaws. To me it sounds like there should be clear regulation about right of way in space. I haven't seen any information pertaining to SpaceX design s…

> To me it sounds like there should be clear regulation about right of way in space Common courtesy worldwide would be for the person causing the risk to move aside first. Worse still it was a private company working on a for-profit product forcing a public weather satellite to divert. There's no need for regulation until bad actors show up.

> There's no need for regulation until bad actors show up.

What a ridiculous statement. I suppose you'd also suggest no need for traffic laws until there's a 50 car pileup?

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#93

Post by mikeash »

lukeschlather wrote: post #87
mabbo wrote: post #33

The ESA is sure making a huge deal out of this. I wonder if politics is involved. https://twitter.com/IridiumBoss/status/1168582141128650753 > Hmmm. We move our satellites on average once a week and don't put out a press release to say who we maneuvered around... -Matt Desch, CEO of Iridium

The ESA asked SpaceX to move to avoid a collision, and they refused. What would happen if a private airline refused the FAA telling them to redirect to avoid a collision, forcing another aircraft to take evasive action? It definitely is political, and it's going to become a bigger problem if SpaceX's approach to potential collisions is just to play chicken.

The ESA isnt a governing authority here. The proper analogy would be two planes in uncontrolled airspace on course to come uncomfortably close. One asks the other to change course, and the other refuses. No FAA involved.

This sort of thing actually happens with some regularity. Airliners and other fancy planes carry TCAS systems which can detect other planes and tell the pilot to maneuver to avoid a collision. If the other plane has TCAS, the two units will coordinate to ensure they don’t both dodge the same way. TCAS can also detect planes that don’t have TCAS, which would be virtually all small planes, and in that instance the TCAS-equipped plane will maneuver to avoid on its own. Airliners routinely fly though airspace where not all traffic is under positive control by ATC. Sometimes they end up on a course that sets off TCAS. The airliner will then maneuver to avoid the collision while the light aircraft pilot remains blissfully unaware, unless they happen to see the airliner fly past.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#95

Post by tomjakubowski »

phkahler wrote: post #72
grecy wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose that's going to be a question in the coming years - does someone get the right of way to a given orbit just because they were there first? Sounds like a fantastic barrier to entry for newcomers who don't have billions lining their pockets.

That is true of all finite resources, from orbits to spectrum to real estate.

Maybe the United Nations (or future world government) could levy an Earth-orbital value tax to ensure orbits are used efficiently.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#96

Post by mikeash »

mLuby wrote: post #46
londons_explore wrote: post #31

The US military tracking isn't very accurate. Errors of hundreds of meters are common. I bet spacex themselves know the location of their satellites to within a few meters. With more accurate data, you can come up with a far more accurate collision risk estimate.

That's fine, but then share that data and there'd be no need to waste delta-v for either satellite. Also these aren't military assets, their specs and locations aren't secret, so if they have better tracking, they should be sharing that.

Maybe they did. This article is awfully light on details and heavy on speculation.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#97

Post by throw0101a »

mikeash wrote: post #93
lukeschlather wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ESA asked SpaceX to move to avoid a collision, and they refused. What would happen if a private airline refused the FAA telling them to redirect to avoid a collision, forcing another aircraft to take evasive action? It definitely is political, and it's going to become a bigger problem if SpaceX's approach to potential collisions is just to play chicken.

The ESA isnt a governing authority here. The proper analogy would be two planes in uncontrolled airspace on course to come uncomfortably close. One asks the other to change course, and the other refuses. No FAA involved. This sort of thing actually happens with some regularity. Airliners and other fancy planes carry TCAS systems which can detect other planes and tell the pilot to maneuver to avoid a collision. If the…

> The ESA isnt a governing authority here.

You're not wrong, but annoying the folks that may be involved in regulatory approval for your venture to get commercially licensed is not prudent.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#98

Post by Rapzid »

saagarjha wrote: post #20

Of course, inside the article it’s explained that SpaceX didn’t “refuse” to move the satellite, they were politely asked to do so and declined for reasons the author is unaware of. Possibly because they couldn’t move the satellite or had a higher collision tolerance.

I think a major topic missed is this 1 in 1000. I think the only chance involved in this, practically speaking, is that the ESAs data about the orbits had enough error in it to not be sure there would be no collision.

This is a lot different than rolling dice or betting on black. Likely there was or was not going to be a collision; run it 1 million times and the results would always be the same. Perhaps Space-X had more optimistic odds.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#99

Post by cuddlecake »

Invictus0 wrote: post #92
dahdum wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To me it sounds like there should be clear regulation about right of way in space Common courtesy worldwide would be for the person causing the risk to move aside first. Worse still it was a private company working on a for-profit product forcing a public weather satellite to divert. There's no need for regulation until bad actors show up.

> There's no need for regulation until bad actors show up. What a ridiculous statement. I suppose you'd also suggest no need for traffic laws until there's a 50 car pileup?

Isn't that how most regulations come to be? People die and people realize it can be avoided?

Bad actors are sometimes involuntarily so.

Re: SpaceX Refused to Move Satellite at Risk of Collision with a European Satellite

#100

Post by foobiekr »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #61
Tuna-Fish wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The likely answer is that the satellite in question was out of control and they couldn't move it. I don't know which Starlink sat this was, but the the other satellite that did dodge seems to be flying at ~300km. This is much lower than what the functional Starlink constellation is. Some of the initial launch failed to unfold their solar panels, and the batteries would have ran down by now, so they are rapidly decayi…

Why are they deorbiting? Didn't they just launch these?

They are test satellites with no lateral switching capability.
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