Musk's Starlink - "death from above"?

[VirtualLarry]

In December, IEEE Spectrum reported that the aggregate chance that SpaceX’s planned Starlink constellation would cause an injury or death on Earth was 45 percent every six years. SpaceX subsequently announced that it would re-design its satellites so that no components would survive re-entry.

Amazon Reports Collision Risk for Mega-Constellation of Kuiper Internet Satellites

Amazon responds to recent FCC questions about the odds that any of its Kuiper communication satellites will collide with space debris

spectrum.ieee.org

 

[nakedfrog]

I like those odds!

 

[snoopy7548]

I'll take my chances with a killer satellite than have to deal with existing ISPs.

 

[GodisanAtheist]

But think of the payout if one of those things hit you!

/s

 

[Red Squirrel]

I think they need to redesign the whole thing so that 1: they don't need so many satellites, and 2: they last longer than 5 years. 5 years is a ridiculously short amount of time for very expensive technology. Then again, some IT shops will spend 100's of thousands on a server infrastructure deployment only to upgrade it all 5 years later.

They could solve both those issues by aiming a bit lower on the speed/latency scale and simply having them at a higher orbit. With the service as planned it will cost so much to upkeep that there is no way it will be affordable for the average joe unless they plan to sell the service at a loss and make money via other methods, or perhaps use it themselves for their missions and the idea of offering service is just a bonus.

Also have to remember that you can't simply destroy matter. Even though it burns up in the atmosphere, all that matter is still all there, and will land in the oceans etc. Not sure if this is something even being considered. It's one thing when it happens once in a while but with the amount of satellites they plan, and the short life span it will be almost daily.

 

[randay]

that was my go to move in battlemech!

 

[VirtualLarry]

Also have to remember that you can't simply destroy matter. Even though it burns up in the atmosphere, all that matter is still all there, and will land in the oceans etc.

What? Methinks that you failed physics. Or I did. Matter can be converted into energy, can't it? Or is that only for nuclear-type reactions, and ordinary chemical/physical reactions, you have the by-products?

What about trash disposal, via plasma furnace? Doesn't that destroy the trash (matter), and turn it into energy (to feed the plasma reaction)? They use those in certain municipalities to get rid of trash. I thought that unlike ordinary waste incinerators, there was no ash left over from the plasma furnace.

 

[Red Squirrel]

What? Methinks that you failed physics. Or I did. Matter can be converted into energy, can't it? Or is that only for nuclear-type reactions, and ordinary chemical/physical reactions, you have the by-products?

What about trash disposal, via plasma furnace? Doesn't that destroy the trash (matter), and turn it into energy (to feed the plasma reaction)? They use those in certain municipalities to get rid of trash. I thought that unlike ordinary waste incinerators, there was no ash left over from the plasma furnace.

Pretty sure it can change format but not vanish. For example when you burn fuel you get some HC based molecules that convert into CO2. The H turns into H2O when it mixes with oxygen in the air. I think?

So when the satellites burn up the molecular structure of the material may change due to the burning but you will end up with some way shape or form with the same atoms. So all the various metals etc. Some may or may not bind with other atoms on the way down. Of course perhaps this transformation actually turns it into something safe, depending on the materials used.

Or maybe I'm wrong?

 

[lxskllr]

They should just crash them into New Jersey. When they come down under your own terms, it isn't a biggie.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I'll take my chances with a killer satellite than have to deal with existing ISPs.

The latency will likely be the killer.
Yeah it would be useful to someone in a remote area and especially useful to someone going far away from civilization but I’ll be majority of us won’t need this service. Can’t change physics that wireless signal has to travel a long distance.

 

[gill77]

Low latency was the whole idea behind low altitude satellites. Not sure how this will all shake out, but interested to find out.

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2018/...ite-network-will-be-massively-profitable.html

 

[Midwayman]

They'll probably make most of their money off financial markets because they are lower latency than even dedicated trans-Atlantic fiber. The speed of light in glass is considerably lower than in a vacuum.

As for a 45% death every 6 years- That stupidly low. I mean zero is better, but any given consumer product is probably that bad, just not studied.

 

[Fritzo]

"The new design will only have a 30% chance of killing someone. That's a 15% improvement!"

 

[NoTine42]

It will be interesting to see the price/speed of the new service.

It’s also very interesting seeing the result of cheaper, more frequent satellite launches.

Before, if there was a satellite hardware problem, it would be years and hundreds of millions for just the New satellite launch. (Plus the cost of the new satellite) so companies spent millions/satellite on insane redundancy because they couldn’t afford launch failures.

It’s now estimated SpaceX is building and launching 60 Starlink satellites/launch at a total cost around $60M ($500k for the sat and another $500k for the launch) They don’t need to spend tens of millions on additional hardware redundancies per satellite because it’s cheaper to launch.