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One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

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Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#241

Post by chermi »

leptons wrote: post #70
bryanlarsen wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The primary benefit of Starship is a sizable reduction of the cost of getting mass to orbit, not Mars dreams.

That's a bit of a re-branding. How does "getting mass to orbit" benefit all of humanity more than what we have now? Not that much, I think, but maybe you have some inside scoop that the rest of us don't know about.

Umm, a lot. Do you know how many cubesats falcon has launched? Did the space station help humanity? Now imagine a bigger one(s) faster. Bigger satellites- do you know how much of James Webb design and difficulty was around packing into tight space? Bigger satellites, big enough for new wavelengths. Big interferometer setups. Microgravity for bio and pharma crap. Better for particles far enough away to be unaffected by earth magnetic field.

Do you agree science is good for humanity? Do you like James Webb? The other things mentioned above? I'd guess yes to all based on your username. How is getting more mass into space of questionable benefit? If starship works, which everyone on earth should be hopeful and excited about, we get more mass for cheaper into space. It's the equivalent of new funding(falcon has brought down launch costs sooo much) while also unlocking previously inconceivable experiments/instruments. Who doesn't like more science funding? Who doesn't like new experiments and instruments?

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#242

Post by fc417fc802 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #91
nicce wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> going to get enough energy out of a collision to pollute nearby orbits. There is no infinite space. The problem is exactly defining the number objects when that "small" amount of energy is actually enough to cause problems.

> There is no infinite space Straw man. > problem is exactly defining the number objects when that "small" amount of energy is actually enough to cause problems The exercise, maybe. The problem? No. In LEO, which is where Starlink orbits, there is no known solution for causing a Kessler cascade that causes more than a few billion in damage. Space isn't infinite, but it's really big. Again, a few hundred thousand plan…

> Space isn't infinite, but it's really big.

Space isn't infinite in the same way that 64 bit integers aren't infinite. Both are infinite for typical usecases.

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#243

Post by robotresearcher »

gambiting wrote: post #222
HanClinto wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because providing infrastructure to remote regions is incredibly difficult through other mechanisms. I don't believe it's hyperbole to say that -- for the goal of improving infrastructure access in some of the most remote and challenging places in the world -- Starlink in particular is one of the most successful pro-humanitarian engineering projects that I can think of in maybe the last 20 years. Starlink is easily o…

>>Starlink in particular is one of the most successful pro-humanitarian engineering projects that I can think of in maybe the last 20 years. Better than gates' effort to eradicate malaria? Sorry to be snarky, but to me Starlink is something rich people in rural England have, because it's slightly easier than paying OpenReach to connect them to proper network. And it's hard to imagine anyone else being their clients,…

> one of the most successful pro-humanitarian engineering projects

That claim does not exclude Gate’s projects or any other as being superior. You’re looking for conflict that isn’t there.

Starlink is used all over the world, by regional governments, NGOs and companies where it’s too expensive for individuals.

You might well find that rich English people are subsidizing the project for poorer people elsewhere.

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#244

Post by chermi »

xnx wrote: post #16
oceanplexian wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A single terminal could serve an entire African village. It's also serving use cases in the Ukraine war, ships at sea, Antarctic research stations, numerous aerospace and military use cases, and so on. DTC is provide texting and emergency services to countless people who might need it in an emergancy, like we saw in North Carolina. Last and most importantly, Starlink exists is to create revenue for SpaceX and to fund…

> The value to humanity of Starship succeeding at its goals is extremely high. Starship to orbit sounds useful, but Starship to Mars is near useless. If that's what rich people want to spend their money on, go nuts.

I'm quite confident if it was anyone besides Elon behind spacex, we'd be hailing starship(cross fingers it works out) as one of the most exciting things we've ever done. And we should be, because it is.

It's something for humanity to be excited about and root for. What happened to wanting to achieve things? Having things to look forward to, build toward and be proud of is healthy for society. Must we aspire to and dream of nothing because there's suffering on earth, is that what it is? Why can't we take it as the objective good it is that we're trying to push technological boundaries that will unlock more advancements in science? In what world does HN not want that?

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#245

Post by ecommerceguy »

terminalshort wrote: post #238
ecommerceguy wrote: post #231

"What’s not usual is the atmospheric fallout. The fiery re-entry of even one Gen1 Starlink satellite produces about 30 kilograms of aluminum oxide vapor, a compound that erodes the ozone layer. A new study finds these oxides have increased 8-fold between 2016 and 2022, and the Great Re-entry Event increases this pollution even more. To put this into perspective: Before the first Starlink launches began in 2019, only…

The fact that they quantified everything here except for the amount of ozone this actually destroys tells me that it's completely insignificant.

I'll refrain my usual snark and just link the same link from the linked article you apparently read.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2024JD04...

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#246

Post by burnt-resistor »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #240
ecommerceguy wrote: post #231

"What’s not usual is the atmospheric fallout. The fiery re-entry of even one Gen1 Starlink satellite produces about 30 kilograms of aluminum oxide vapor, a compound that erodes the ozone layer. A new study finds these oxides have increased 8-fold between 2016 and 2022, and the Great Re-entry Event increases this pollution even more. To put this into perspective: Before the first Starlink launches began in 2019, only…

Earth receives ~50,000 kg/day of cosmic dust (our mid-range assumption), 30 kg is 0.06% of that daily amount.

But how much of that is aluminum? Probably Nit: You're off by about a factor of 3 because it's 14.6 t/day.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/antarctic-study-s...

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#247

Post by elcritch »

gambiting wrote: post #222
HanClinto wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because providing infrastructure to remote regions is incredibly difficult through other mechanisms. I don't believe it's hyperbole to say that -- for the goal of improving infrastructure access in some of the most remote and challenging places in the world -- Starlink in particular is one of the most successful pro-humanitarian engineering projects that I can think of in maybe the last 20 years. Starlink is easily o…

>>Starlink in particular is one of the most successful pro-humanitarian engineering projects that I can think of in maybe the last 20 years. Better than gates' effort to eradicate malaria? Sorry to be snarky, but to me Starlink is something rich people in rural England have, because it's slightly easier than paying OpenReach to connect them to proper network. And it's hard to imagine anyone else being their clients,…

Access to information has historically been a great equalizer.

Not to diminish Gates’ malaria efforts, but remote villages having access to information about malaria and prevention methods could be helpful. Along with techniques for filtering water, etc. Access to telehealth.

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#248

Post by [deleted] »

ecommerceguy wrote: post #231

"What’s not usual is the atmospheric fallout. The fiery re-entry of even one Gen1 Starlink satellite produces about 30 kilograms of aluminum oxide vapor, a compound that erodes the ozone layer. A new study finds these oxides have increased 8-fold between 2016 and 2022, and the Great Re-entry Event increases this pollution even more. To put this into perspective: Before the first Starlink launches began in 2019, only…

[deleted]

Re: One to two Starlink satellites are falling back to Earth each day

#250

Post by asadotzler »

smallerize wrote: post #152
benjiro wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, those are the original / older gen sats, that have way less capacity then the newer models. They are moving away from tons of small sats and more to larger (with longer life time) sats that have multiple times the capacity, of the combined smaller sats. Quoting a older post i made on the subject: ------- Take in account, that a lot of those are replacement sats for the first generations that they are deorbiting…

They keep the satellites relatively low for latency, and that means they still need a lot of them for line-of-sight coverage, right? They have plans to add 15,000 more satellites. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/10/starlinks-ambiti...

They had global line of site coverage long ago, but with limited capacity. Now they're growing capacity.
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