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Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

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Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#21

Post by bewaretheirs »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #8

How does a satellite break up in orbit? Was it struck by something?

It's more likely that something energetic happened with an onboard system (propulsion or batteries). Could just be leaky valves causing propellant and oxidizer to meet somewhere they shouldn't..

It's had a few propulsion system issues:

> On 9 September 2016, Intelsat announced that due to a malfunction in the LEROS-1c primary thruster, it would require more time for orbit rising ...

> In August 2017, another propulsion issue appeared, leading to larger-than-expected propellant usage to control the satellite attitude during the north/south station keeping maneuvers. This issue reduced the orbital life-time by about 3.5 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelsat_33e

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#22

Post by wongarsu »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #8

How does a satellite break up in orbit? Was it struck by something?

It's anyways possible that it was struck by a meteorite or a piece of space debris that's too small to be tracked.

But these satellites also carry fuel for orbit keeping, evasion manoeuvres and going to a graveyard orbit at its end of life. Given that this satellite had two separate propulsion issues and Intelsat-29e suffered from electrostatic discharge it's not difficult to imagine the satellite igniting its fuel in an uncontrolled manner

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#23

Post by perihelions »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #8

How does a satellite break up in orbit? Was it struck by something?

There's a lot of stored energy in satellites: fuel, gas pressurizers, batteries. End-of-life geosynchronous satellites sometimes drain all of these, deliberately, to limit their hazard as space junk.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passivation_(spacecraft)

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#24

Post by worstspotgain »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #8

How does a satellite break up in orbit? Was it struck by something?

An accidental strike is unlikely. Either a massive malfunction, or maybe ASAT [1]. ASAT is always going to be a possibility from now on simply because the target might prefer to deny getting hit.

[1] https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2024-03/news/us-warns-new-ru...

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#25

Post by dylan604 »

From TFA, this bird is the 2nd in this "next generation" of satellites. The first one also failed because either "a meteoroid impact or a wiring flaw that led to an electrostatic discharge following heightened solar weather activity."

That's a pretty specific flaw to then just write it off to a meteor.

So they are 0 for 2. Does not instill confidence in this "next generation" at all.

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#26

Post by SteveNuts »

dylan604 wrote: post #9
SteveNuts wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They should teach it in every MBA program in the country /s.

You joke, but it absolutely should. Boeing is a great example of "when all you have is a hammer, everything is a nail". When MBAs are left in charge with no guardrails, this is what can happen. That's a great thing to teach to new MBAs. Every field has this potential pitfall. When you hyperfocus, bad things can happen. Know when to say when.

Yeah I didn't really know how to articulate nuance of the sarcasm in my comment, I fully agree it should.

But it's such a massive clusterfuck for Boeing that it seems like MBA programs should be reformed from the ground up.

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#27

Post by nordsieck »

accrual wrote: post #5
nordsieck wrote: post #4

It is particularly bad for a satellite in geostationary orbit to break up or fail. Satellites are packed as tightly as possible into that orbit due to its economic importance (it's very useful for a satellite, particularly communications satellites, to always be over the same part of the Earth), so there is a higher than normal likelihood that this could be seriously disruptive.

Indeed, Intelsat 33e has a couple nearby neighbors in similar orbits and inclinations. ID Name Orbit Incl. 98050A ASTRA 2A 57.2 4.93 09017A WGS F2 (USA 204) 57.5 0.01 14023B KAZSAT-3 58.5 0.02 12008A BEIDOU-2 G5 58.7 2.10 16053B INTELSAT 33E (IS-33E) 60.0 0.04 https://www.satsig.net/sslist.htm

Looks like WGS-10 is the closest.

From Wikipedia, it looks like it's a USSF satellite launched in 2019 with a service life of 14 years. It provides wideband communications to DoD customers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA-291

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#28

Post by naikrovek »

perihelions wrote: post #10
nordsieck wrote: post #4

It is particularly bad for a satellite in geostationary orbit to break up or fail. Satellites are packed as tightly as possible into that orbit due to its economic importance (it's very useful for a satellite, particularly communications satellites, to always be over the same part of the Earth), so there is a higher than normal likelihood that this could be seriously disruptive.

- "Satellites are packed as tightly as possible into that orbit due to its economic importance" Note that that's in the sense of angular separation, as viewed from the ground. They're physically hundreds of kilometers apart. edit: (Geostationary orbits are ~42,000 km from the Earth center-of-mass; each degree of angle is an arc of ~700 km).

> They're physically hundreds of kilometers apart.

That’s pretty close when your neighbor just exploded and there’s almost exactly zero air resistance to prevent debris from reaching you.

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#29

Post by mppm »

schiffern wrote: post #17
milgrim wrote: post #2

For some context: The same Boeing satellite bus already experienced a major issue some years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19658800

I know the Boeing connection is the most "sexy" cause, so people are probably going to run with it anyway, but I also have to wonder about a space debris collision. GEO is already quite polluted, and the "graveyard orbits" commonly used have been shown to be inadequate.[1] Can anyone tell whether (at 60 degrees East and at 4:30 UTC October 19) the satellite was passing through the intersection with the main plane of…

Maybe. But it's probably just Boeing :) This was a fairly young satellite, launched in 2016, and beset with propulsion problems from the start. It was also the second of a new series, and the first one has already failed as well.

Re: Intelsat 33e breaks up in geostationary orbit

#30

Post by milgrim »

schiffern wrote: post #17
milgrim wrote: post #2

For some context: The same Boeing satellite bus already experienced a major issue some years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19658800

I know the Boeing connection is the most "sexy" cause, so people are probably going to run with it anyway, but I also have to wonder about a space debris collision. GEO is already quite polluted, and the "graveyard orbits" commonly used have been shown to be inadequate.[1] Can anyone tell whether (at 60 degrees East and at 4:30 UTC October 19) the satellite was passing through the intersection with the main plane of…

The more interesting part for me is that a satellite just exploded, that it's made by Boeing is just the cherry on top.
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