Spacecraft From Chinese Launch Nearly Slammed Into Starlink Satellite, SpaceX Says
One of SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites just dodged a bullet in orbit.
That bullet was one of the nine spacecraft that launched atop a Chinese Kinetica 1 rocket on Tuesday (Dec. 9) from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert. It zoomed dangerously close to aStarlinksatellite, according toSpaceXwhich was none too pleased with the close shave.
“As far as we know, no coordination or deconfliction with existingsatellitesoperating in space was performed, resulting in a 200-meter close approach between one of the deployed satellites and STARLINK-6079 (56120) at 560 km altitude. Most of the risk of operating in space comes from the lack of coordination between satellite operators — this needs to change,” Michael Nicolls, vice president of Starlink engineering at SpaceX,said via Xon Friday evening (Dec. 12).
Kinetica 1 is a 100-foot-tall (30 meters) solid-fuelrocketoperated by CAS Space. The company, which is based in Guangzhou, responded to Nicolls’ post, saying that it did its due diligence as the launch services provider (LSP) but is looking into the incident nonetheless.
“Our team is currently in contact for details. All CAS Space launches select their launch windows using the ground-based space awareness system to avoid collisions with known satellites/debris.
This is a mandatory procedure. We will work on identifying the exact details and provide assistance as the LSP,” CAS Spacesaid via Xon Friday night.
Tuesday’s Kinetica 1 launch lofted “six Chinese multifunctional satellites, an Earth-observation satellite for the UAE (United Arab Emirates}, a scientific satellite for Egypt and an educational satellite for Nepal,”according to China Daily. Nicolls’ post did not specify which of these spacecraft zoomed close to the Starlink satellite.
The coordination that Nicolls cited is becoming and important, for Earth orbit is getting and crowded. In 2020, for example,fewer than 3,400functional satellites were whizzing around our planet. Just five years later, that number has soared toabout 13,000and spacecraft are going up all the time.
Most of them belong to SpaceX. The company currently operatesnearly 9,300 Starlink satellitesthan 3,000 of which have launched this year alone.
Starlink satellites avoid potential collisions autonomously, maneuvering themselves away from conjunctions predicted by available tracking data. And this sort of evasive action is quite common: Starlink spacecraft performed about145,000 avoidance maneuversin the first six months of 2025, which works out to around four maneuvers per satellite per month.
That’s an impressive record. But many other spacecraft aren’t quite so capable, and even Starlink satellites can be blindsided by spacecraft whose operators don’t share their trajectory data, as Nicolls noted.
And even a single collision — between two satellites, or involving pieces ofspace junkwhich are plentiful in Earth orbit as well — could spawn a huge cloud of debris, which could cause further collisions. Indeed, the nightmare scenario, known as theKessler syndromeis a debris cascade that makes it difficult or impossible to operate satellites in parts of the final frontier.
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Author:[email protected] (Mike Wall)
Published on:2025-12-13 08:59:00
Source: www.space.com
Disclaimer: This news article has been republished exactly as it appeared on its original source, without any modification.
We do not take any responsibility for its content, which remains solely the responsibility of the original publisher.
Author: uaetodaynews
Published on: 2025-12-13 07:08:00
Source: uaetodaynews.com
