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Low Earth Orbit Visualization

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Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#141

Post by rlt »

schiffern wrote: post #128
WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Even low Earth orbit is absolutely gigantic. It’s considerably larger than the surface of the Earth after all. Scott Manley has the same issue that this website: for things to be seen, you need to magnify them extremely. Each dot here represents things at most meters large. Most are centimetres large especially if you look at debris. Yet each dot is the size of a large urban area on Earth. Do the same thi…

>Obviously, to size would be less scary. I was expecting this, since it's probably the most common criticism of this type of visualization. Problem is, that analysis only looks at half the dataviz fidelity coin. It recognizes the (unavoidable) loss of fidelity in size , but it ignores the (also unavoidable) loss of fidelity in time. In the real world these objects do not remain orbiting Earth for a few minutes (ie th…

Maybe I’m optimistic, but I believe within a decade full and rapid reusability of launch vehicles, i.e. Starship (if successful), will radically change what is economical in space, to the point of collecting/deorbiting space debris.

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#142

Post by mickdeek86 »

cwillu wrote: post #139
mickdeek86 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this mean the concerns about a Kessler event are greatly exaggerated?

You're kinda asking if a number is too big, without saying which number you're asking about.

I'm asking whether Kessler syndrome is something we should be worried about

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#143

Post by ghufran_syed »

mickdeek86 wrote: post #142
cwillu wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're kinda asking if a number is too big, without saying which number you're asking about.

I'm asking whether Kessler syndrome is something we should be worried about

No, not until the density of objects in LEO is much higher IMO

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#144

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

schiffern wrote: post #134
WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I was expecting this, since it's probably the most common criticism of this type of visualization. Problem is, that analysis only looks at half the dataviz fidelity coin. It recognizes the (unavoidable) loss of fidelity in size, but it ignores the (also unavoidable) loss of fidelity in time. It’s a real time visualisation. There is no loss of fidelity in time. Noticing the important distortion in size is legitimate…

>It’s a real time visualisation. There is no loss of fidelity in time. Unless you're going to spend multiple lifetimes watching it in "real time," there is unavoidable loss of fidelity here. I don't mean fidelity in rate-of-time, but in duration-of-time. The total time available limits the duration fidelity, just as our eyeballs and screens limit the size fidelity. Again it's less obvious (hence this confusion), but…

> Your point about "legitimacy" is right on. In data visualization the goal is finding the most useful (least misleading) transform of the data, not raw fidelity.

I made no point about legitimacy. The fact remains. It is a real time visualisation. It’s interesting to consider what’s currently flying above. It’s not a collision estimation tool.

> Bingo. The "scariness" comes from (where else?) the collision probability, and our estimate thereof.

There is nothing scary about the probability of collision however. Even when you take the very large safety margin the monitoring organisations like to take probability is very low.

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#145

Post by schiffern »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #144
schiffern wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It’s a real time visualisation. There is no loss of fidelity in time. Unless you're going to spend multiple lifetimes watching it in "real time," there is unavoidable loss of fidelity here. I don't mean fidelity in rate-of-time, but in duration-of-time. The total time available limits the duration fidelity, just as our eyeballs and screens limit the size fidelity. Again it's less obvious (hence this confusion), but…

> Your point about "legitimacy" is right on. In data visualization the goal is finding the most useful (least misleading) transform of the data, not raw fidelity. I made no point about legitimacy. The fact remains. It is a real time visualisation. It’s interesting to consider what’s currently flying above. It’s not a collision estimation tool. > Bingo. The "scariness" comes from (where else?) the collision probabilit…

>It’s not a collision estimation tool.

Agreed, but then why did you say it gets less "scary" when you realize the size is exaggerated here?

What else could you be scared of, if you're not (implicitly) using the visualization to estimate collision probability?

Some sort of thalassephobia for giant space objects, perhaps?

>probability is very low

Now keep rolling those dice every day for hundreds or thousands of years. Thousands of dice, for thousands of objects.

People are historically bad at imagining that (just like we're bad at large distances), which is why compressing the duration is misleading.

Risk = probability * cost. The cost of collisions (both the immediate cost and the long-term cost from additional debris generation) is very high.

>There is nothing scary about the probability of collision

If you watch the video I linked earlier, it explains how we're already past the "tipping point." Even if all launches cease (spoiler: they won't), the debris problem would continue to get worse.

Maybe that isn't a scary situation to you, but it is to me.

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#146

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

schiffern wrote: post #145
WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your point about "legitimacy" is right on. In data visualization the goal is finding the most useful (least misleading) transform of the data, not raw fidelity. I made no point about legitimacy. The fact remains. It is a real time visualisation. It’s interesting to consider what’s currently flying above. It’s not a collision estimation tool. > Bingo. The "scariness" comes from (where else?) the collision probabilit…

>It’s not a collision estimation tool. Agreed, but then why did you say it gets less "scary" when you realize the size is exaggerated here? What else could you be scared of , if you're not (implicitly) using the visualization to estimate collision probability? Some sort of thalassephobia for giant space objects, perhaps? >probability is very low Now keep rolling those dice every day for hundreds or thousands of years…

> It’s not a collision estimation tool.

It’s a comment about how full it is, not about how likely things are to collide and a reply to a previous comment.

> Now keep rolling those dice every day for hundreds of years. Thousands of dice, for thousands of objects.

Still low.

Orbits between 700km and 800km are mostly lost after the past two decade antisatellites tests. Lower orbits clean fast especially the ones used by the recent large satellites fleet and space above 800km is mostly empty apart from the band with large USSR boosters which is easy to avoid.

Risk is not very high. It is managed adequately and the legislation is properly anticipating current developments.

It’s important to remember that space is extremely large and we are talking about thousands of things. Having too much debris clustered in a small range of altitude makes it not economically viable to operate there but it doesn’t prevent us from going through at all.

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#147

Post by schiffern »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #146
schiffern wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It’s not a collision estimation tool. Agreed, but then why did you say it gets less "scary" when you realize the size is exaggerated here? What else could you be scared of , if you're not (implicitly) using the visualization to estimate collision probability? Some sort of thalassephobia for giant space objects, perhaps? >probability is very low Now keep rolling those dice every day for hundreds or thousands of years…

> It’s not a collision estimation tool. It’s a comment about how full it is, not about how likely things are to collide and a reply to a previous comment. > Now keep rolling those dice every day for hundreds of years. Thousands of dice, for thousands of objects. Still low. Orbits between 700km and 800km are mostly lost after the past two decade antisatellites tests. Lower orbits clean fast especially the ones used by…

>It’s a comment about how full it is

Why is that "scary," though?

It's not like "running out of room" is a plausible risk. Kessler Syndrome limits you long before that.

>Risk is not very high. It is managed adequately and the legislation is properly anticipating current developments

See my edit to parent, and watch the video (especially the future simulations). The situation is far from "managed adequately" IMO.

This has been fun, and I sense we're starting to go in circles (no pun intended). My upvotes, for being such a good sport. Cheers!

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#148

Post by rebelde »

modeless wrote: post #31
ubj wrote: post #28

Those long, straight-line convoys of Starlink satellites are fascinating. There's a few of them I could see scattered around the Earth. At what point do they start breaking up into unrelated orbits? Looking forward to using this website to try spotting satellites at night. There's something strangely thrilling about seeing objects in the night sky that were placed there by people.

For spotting satellites at night, try my site: https://james.darpinian.com/satellites/ Most of the satellites shown on the Leolabs site are too dim to see without a telescope because they don't reflect enough light. My site calculates brightness and filters down to the ones that you can see with the unaided eye. There are still quite a few! ISS in particular is very bright and can even be seen before sunset. The new…

This site is great and is one of my favorites. I occasionally check it and set an alarm on my phone. I will announce to the people that I am with "satellites passing in 3 minutes", run outside and impress people. Great fun. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Re: Low Earth Orbit Visualization

#149

Post by noud »

I'm amazed how large satellites have become. They are larger than small countries, like Luxembourg, Cyprus, Trinidad, ... How do they get these huge satellites up in space? Unbelievable...
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