41–50 of 106 posts
Is the word "plummet" really appropriate here? They're talking about falling at a rate of 0.001mph, which is much faster than expected but hardly a "plummet."
Wow, so you are telling me satellites are falling to earth and burning up in the atmosphere? No? Oh.. ok.
Too many HN threads just seem to be people arguing about the appropriateness of the title. The article addresses a significant and interesting issue that's going to have major negative effects on business models, as well as some positive effect on space junk. I think they did a decent job, at least for an article intended for the general public, and I'm glad I read it. And yes, the word "plummet" is an exaggeration.…
I am thinking about a commercial data product to address the situational awareness need here. It feels daunting though, because customers would be the likes of SpaceX and other intimidating entities. If anyone has thoughts, or is interested, please send me an email. (Contact info in profile!) Thanks.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well now that we've determined that plummet maybe isn't the right word to use, shall we discuss the fact that satellites are unexpectedly falling from the sky in yet another climate change that we had not predicted?
While solar phenomena influences climate, this aspect is not human induced. We have put artificial satellites up there, in earth orbit, but they are not causing solar eruptions or solar flares. We don't understand solar "climate" enough to say that it's changing (cycle frequency, amplitude, etc).
We certainly do know a fair amount about the sun's "climate": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_cycle
The sun has an 11-year solar cycle where each cycle has a period of low and high sunspot activity and currently we are just starting Cycle 25 with a corresponding uptick of solar flare activity.
I am thinking about a commercial data product to address the situational awareness need here. It feels daunting though, because customers would be the likes of SpaceX and other intimidating entities. If anyone has thoughts, or is interested, please send me an email. (Contact info in profile!) Thanks.
Some competition: http://acswa.us/about/members.html
Is the word "plummet" really appropriate here? They're talking about falling at a rate of 0.001mph, which is much faster than expected but hardly a "plummet."
Yes, orbit decay having gone up by a factor of ~10 is indeed plummeting. You park things in low earth orbit so that they don't stay up forever and indeed come down in reasonably small human-scale timeframes. Usually on the time scale of decades, sometimes more, sometimes less. If you designed a satellite to stay up for 10 years, it'll suddenly only be able to stay up a year, that's the scale of these things. Again it…
However unless the author happens to know a lot about orbital mechanics (or they've played Kerbal Space Program) they probably just picked an expressive word for the sake of a compelling article rather than something that would give a better picture to the layperson.
Is the word "plummet" really appropriate here? They're talking about falling at a rate of 0.001mph, which is much faster than expected but hardly a "plummet."
They also say Starlink fully lost 40 satellites to solar weather (were decelerated rapidly enough to burn up in the atmosphere, before their orbits could be rescued). There's a range of outcomes. Thread about that: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30267587 (488 comments)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, orbit decay having gone up by a factor of ~10 is indeed plummeting. You park things in low earth orbit so that they don't stay up forever and indeed come down in reasonably small human-scale timeframes. Usually on the time scale of decades, sometimes more, sometimes less. If you designed a satellite to stay up for 10 years, it'll suddenly only be able to stay up a year, that's the scale of these things. Again it…
I think the primary objection is that to the vast majority of people 'plummet' implies the satellite is suddenly and violently falling from the sky - it's the kind of word people would describe an airplane crash with. However unless the author happens to know a lot about orbital mechanics (or they've played Kerbal Space Program) they probably just picked an expressive word for the sake of a compelling article rather…
It isn't the journalist but the nitpicking commentors who are clueless. The headline accurately enough conveys what is happening and the article articulates it well. Orbital mechanics isn't intuitive enough for there to be perfect fit words given human experience, human timescales, "plummet" is fine.
Too many HN threads just seem to be people arguing about the appropriateness of the title. The article addresses a significant and interesting issue that's going to have major negative effects on business models, as well as some positive effect on space junk. I think they did a decent job, at least for an article intended for the general public, and I'm glad I read it. And yes, the word "plummet" is an exaggeration.…
"But that isn't a big deal." It's clickbait. I appreciate people pointing out clickbait. I think a lot of others do as well; it's why they read the comments on an article before the look at the article. Had the story been titled "Solar Weather Causes Unexpected Satellite Orbit Decay" or some other non-clickbait thing I'd have read it without looking at comments first. I'm actually interested in solar weather due to i…