SpaceX, the aerospace manufacturing company, owned by Elon Musk, announced today that a recent solar storm has severely impacted recently launched satellites.
In a statement posted yesterday, the company announced that it had launched 49 Starlink satellites on Thursday, estimating that 40 of those satellites would be destroyed because of a geomagnetic storm.
These solar storms, according to SpaceX, causes “the atmosphere to warm and atmospheric density at our low deployment altitudes to increase.”
SpaceX anticipates that those damaged satellites will “re-enter or already have re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere.” Though SpaceX says that the de-orbited satellites pose “zero collision risk” with other satellites and are, by design, “demise upon atmospheric reentry.” Meaning no orbital debris will be created, and no satellite parts are expected to hit the ground.
Operators attempted to pilot the satellites in “safe-mode” but they ultimately entered the lower atmosphere where they burned up on re-entry.
Although losing 40 satellites may not be a big deal for the SpaceX-operated satellite internet service. While more than half of its new satellites are burning up in the atmosphere, the company announced that it reached a milestone of 2,000 satellites launched in January. And the company is planning to launch at least 12,000 satellites, as noted in 2019.
Taylor is the Associate Tech Editor at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.
Blogroll Credit: SpaceX
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