NASA raised points about SpaceX’s new Starlink satellites, along with an increase of the prospect of collision in orbit, in a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
The five-page letter was submitted to the FCC Tuesday (Feb. 8) and was first reported in SpaceNews. The letter, which contains a separate one-page letter from the National Science Foundation, was despatched on NASA’s behalf by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration.
SpaceX submitted a proposal to the FCC to position 30,000 further Starlink internet satellites into orbit as part of a “Gen 2” Starlink system. There are presently about 1,800 operational Starlink satellites in orbit and there have already been a variety of near-misses in orbit; one analysis has steered Starlinks are accountable for half of all close encounters in low-Earth orbit.
With this observe report, NASA has some vital reservations about SpaceX’s proposed new fleet.
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NASA has “concerns with the potential for a significant increase in the frequency of conjunction events and possible impacts to NASA’s science and human spaceflight missions,” the corporate mentioned inside the letter, which was signed by Samantha Fonder, acknowledged as NASA’s advisor to the Commercial Space Transportation Interagency Group.
“NASA wants to ensure that the deployment of the Starlink Gen 2 system is conducted prudently, in a manner that supports spaceflight safety and the long-term sustainability of the space environment,” the letter supplies.
According to the letter, NASA has important points about whether or not or not or not SpaceX’s automated collision avoidance system may be adequate to cowl the five-fold enhance of objects in orbit. All of these 1000’s of newest satellites will probably impression every crewed and uncrewed missions in orbit, the corporate says, due to an “increase in conjunctions” or shut encounters with totally different objects.
This not solely creates and can improve collision hazard, nevertheless it moreover supplies launch hazard, as there may be fewer launch house home windows obtainable due to 1000’s further satellites passing inside a rocket’s deliberate flight path.
“NASA is also concerned with an increasing unavailability of safe launch windows, especially for missions requiring instantaneous or short launch windows,” the corporate acknowledged, citing the Europa Clipper mission as an illustration.
SpaceX’s Gen 2 satellites will even foreseeably set off points for current scientific missions. The new satellites might double the number of Hubble Space Telescope pictures that embody satellite streaks. That amount of interference now stands at 8%, the corporate acknowledged.
Worse, these additional Starlink satellites might worsen the prospect of interference with planetary safety surveys carried out by ground-based telescope, which NASA makes use of to scan the skies for most likely threatening asteroids (no imminent celestial objects have however been found for our planet.)
The firm, however, did not categorical categorical opposition to the FCC granting SpaceX a license for Starlink Gen 2, nevertheless instead acknowledged that such an enlargement would require shut coordination with totally different affected occasions. SpaceX, which not typically responds to media inquiries, did not reply to a SpaceInformation request for a response.
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