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Re:Satellites Are Littering Our Solar System at a Rapid Speed by zelon88 on Sunday April 25, 2021 @01:37PM (#26934629)
As far as collisions; I am not sure. I know that US Space Command monitors low earth orbit and if you are the operator of an asset which is in the path of another asset they will contact both parties to organize a response. Usually this requires one or more assets being moved. Whether or not the operator of the asset is cooperative with US Space Command is entirely deterministic on the relationship of the operator to US Space Command. Russian military satellite operators probably won't answer that phone call.

But that is not the only threat they pose. If you see the links I posted, the satellites are so low, so reflective, and so numerous that they impact ground based astronomy of all kinds. From the reflection of the sun off their metal components to the radio interference they emit; these satellite's are a menace to the scientific community.

I'm sure the logistical challenges they provide to operators trying to launch new spacecraft is significant as well. And there are other organizations from other countries building similar constellations in low-earth orbit. These are all disjointed teams with little to no knowledge of each others existence, let alone communication with each other. We need a regulatory body with the authority to gather all vested parties and hash out some rules that work for everyone. We needed this done BEFORE SpaceX shipped a portion of the world's precious metals into low earth orbit. But that didn't happen. And universities are paying the price while SpaceX turns profit in space.

Re:Satellites Are Littering Our Solar System at a Rapid Speed by h2odragon on Sunday April 25, 2021 @02:02PM (#26934917)
> BEFORE SpaceX shipped a portion of the world's precious metals into low earth orbit.

Admirable passion, but I suspect you've been informed unevenly: do please read further on what exactly "low earth orbit" actually means. This stuff will be back, fairly soon.

Re:Satellites Are Littering Our Solar System at a Rapid Speed by copenocoiner on Sunday April 25, 2021 @02:11PM (#26935024)
> From the reflection of the sun off their metal components to the radio interference they emit; these satellite's are a menace to the scientific community.

May I suggest that the development of this technology, cheap satellites, for commercial purposes will reduce the costs for scientific purposes. More labs will eventually be able to launch observing satellites for themselves. Not a perfect outcome, better if we had our cake and got to eat it, but in this case we get cheap global internet and cheap(er) satellite launches for all purposes.

Re:Satellites Are Littering Our Solar System at a Rapid Speed by rcxdude on Sunday April 25, 2021 @03:38PM (#26935881)
There's a world of difference between launching a comms satellite and launching a telescope. The most affected form of astronomy (radio astronomy), can't even be feasibly done from orbit, not even with the next few generations of launch vehicles.

(Also starlink is a solution for a relative few: it does not represent serious competition for traditional ISPs because there are still significant limits on the density of connections it can support. It's great if you're in the middle of nowhere and there's relatively few people around you. It sucks in cities. It's not going to supply internet to even a significant fraction of any country, bar some micronations)

Re:Satellites Are Littering Our Solar System at a Rapid Speed by rhodozelia on Sunday April 25, 2021 @03:40PM (#26935891)
Astronomy will only be possible from satellites that are further away from earth than all the LEO satellites.

I’m not convinced the squeeze is worth the juice. Starlink wasn’t necessary, there are/were alternatives. Hopefully it forces the terrestrial providers to step their game up, we all get FTTH, and then starlink can all crash in to the atmosphere before collisions pollute all of earths orbits and render them all unusable for the few valuable services that can only be done from space.