SpaceX Launches 60 New Starlink Satellites (techcrunch.com) 58
SpaceX has launched another batch of its Starlink satellites -- the usual complement of 60 of the low Earth orbit spacecraft, which will join the more than 1,000 already making up the existing constellation. This is the fifth launch of Starlink satellites for SpaceX this year, and the 20th overall. From a report: Earlier this year, SpaceX opened up Starlink access to anyone in a current or planned service area via a pre-order reservation system with a refundable up-front deposit. The company aims to continue launches like this one apace throughout 2021 in order to get the constellation to the point where it can serve customers over a much larger portion of the globe.
SpaceX COO and President Gwynne Shotwell has previously said that the company expects it should have coverage over much of the globe at a constellation size of around 1,200 satellites, but the company has plans to launch more than 30,000 to fully build out its network capacity and speed. While SpaceX is making good progress on Starlink with its Falcon 9 launcher, it's also looking ahead to Starship as a key driver of the constellation's growth. Starship, SpaceX's next-generation launch vehicle currently under development in South Texas, will be able to deliver 400 Starlink satellites at a time to orbit, and it's also being designed with full reusability and fast turnaround in mind.
SpaceX COO and President Gwynne Shotwell has previously said that the company expects it should have coverage over much of the globe at a constellation size of around 1,200 satellites, but the company has plans to launch more than 30,000 to fully build out its network capacity and speed. While SpaceX is making good progress on Starlink with its Falcon 9 launcher, it's also looking ahead to Starship as a key driver of the constellation's growth. Starship, SpaceX's next-generation launch vehicle currently under development in South Texas, will be able to deliver 400 Starlink satellites at a time to orbit, and it's also being designed with full reusability and fast turnaround in mind.
Yay! (Score:5, Funny)
A chance at first post, really? Wow, what should I say? I mean, I guess it should be related to the topic, so maybe I could talk about the fact that Elon Musk is an time trav{#`%${%&`+'${`%&NO CARRIER
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If he can do launches each month that constellation will fill out quickly. Enough to have time left over to do everyone else's LEO constellation.
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Re:Yay! (Score:5, Funny)
Meanwhile, Musk is already planning the just-above-LEO constellation of telescope satellites to sell to astronomers.
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The Simpsons is a common reference but few people talk about Green Acres.
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Hubble space telescope is booked years in advance they only select 200 proposals a year (from over a thousand that can even afford to make a decent proposal). Telescopes in space would be quite a lucrative business.
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I knew it. Elon Musk is an inter-galactic peeping tom.
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He is planning on being on the moon by end of 2023 and putting in Telescopes in the many craters there. The lunar poles are the PERFECT place for those.
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Umm. No, only the astronomers who hate space and the space industry and broadened access to science education would be against this. So how many of those can there be? Shouldn't clouds and birds be a bigger concern than satellites? Why don't we see astronomers trying to eradicate clouds or birds?
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Why don't we see astronomers trying to eradicate clouds or birds?
Finally, a cause I can get behind!
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You're in luck, I made another one just a few posts down!
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To compensate, Elon will offer free transportation of telescope hardware to the moon, where it will enjoy vastly better observation results than anything earth-bound.
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That would be nice, but then you have to account for that big blue/grayish rock filled with stupid monkeys blocking your view once in a while.
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You put your telescope on the far side of the moon, it won't get blocked by the earth for well over 10,000 years.
Astronomy will eventually move to space (Score:3)
The earth needs internet more than terrestrial astronomy, and needs is now while astronomy can wait since there is nothing of URGENT importance to be found. Astronomy, like manned space tourism, could wait indefinitely.
The passion of astronomers is understandable, but it's a luxury not an economic necessity and the two should not be confused.
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BS, astronomy helps to drive advances in optics and electronics.
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Partially true until war returns us to the stone age. But that aside, technology can evolve independent of war .. for example vaccine technology was developed not to survive war .. even though it can help to have your soldiers vaccinated. Lots of technologies that are useful in war were developed independently of it. Airplanes, automobiles, and hot air balloons, which played a big part in war .. were not developed for that purpose. Neither were telescopes. So while war has brought certain technology such as
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Amazing how quickly people forget about all the killer asteroids. One of those hits there will no longer be a need for internet. Astronomy helps with dealing with that problem.
Re: Astronomy will eventually move to space (Score:1)
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Being able to put massive amounts of stuff into interplanetary space is the only hope for actually saving the planet from a killer asteroid. SpaceX is by far the best hope for doing this.
Not to mention that Must will be able to easily deploy, to orbit or the Moon, better telescopes than anything we currently have.
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Why the hell do you think Elon Musk is so obsessed with building a human colony on Mars? It's because he's a time trav{#`%${%&`+'${`%&NO CARRIER
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About the same level of question as "what will we do when nukes are used" except we have a chance of seeing what's incoming, and can potentially do more, while nukes have no such warning.
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Other than telling everyone when to kiss their asses goodbye, what would the astronomy community actually be able to do about an approaching killer asteroid?
Well, you have basically harmless meteorites and then there are killers that cause extinction level events, but there is also a lot of in-between. Asteroids that could take out a town or city or state. If you know one of those is coming, and you can approximate where/when it will hit, you can evacuate the impact site or coastal areas that might be inundated by the impact for an ocean landing. Just because it only saves some people as opposed to the entire world is not a reason to dismiss the benefit out of
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Much better to push it out of the way instead of being willing to sacrifice a city or state. SpaceX is a big step toward being able to push it out of the way. Astronomers will only ever be able to tell people to run away while their homes are destroyed (in the best possible case).
I'm not suggesting that astronomy is unimportant. I'm suggesting that the proper place for telescopes is above the Earth's atmosphere. SpaceX will make that practical.
Meanwhile, the Starlink satellites are no more a problem
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Much better to push it out of the way instead of being willing to sacrifice a city or state.
Oh certainly better if you can stop it from hitting at all. It's just that it's not pointless to know they're coming if you can't prevent them from hitting since, in most cases, there are steps you can take to minimize damage and loss of life if you have prior warning.
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I doubt that astronomers would be able to pinpoint the exact spot a "Less-than-civilization-ending-but-more-than-a-minor-annoyance" asteroid would hit. The best they could probably do is narrow it down to the hemisphere and perhaps the quadrant of the Earth facing the asteroid at the time of impact.
In reality, most "near miss" asteroids are discovered (at best) days before they hit or after they have passed. Any asteroid that could be detected far in advanced would be too big to do anything about it (eith
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Simple things like getting away from the coast and going to safe shelters with strong roofs, not standing in front of glass windows, etc. when the thing hits could go a long way. We have some pretty good ideas about what sort of things will happen. Windows blown in, weak structures collapsing entirely, potential tsunamis, etc. Even without pinpointing the exact spot it would hit, there is still a lot that can be done to prepare people.
That said, moving astronomy into space and having the ability to actually
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ahahaha in what way does Astronomy help with that problem??
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The atmosphere is a bug, not a feature, and easier access to space will eventually include amateur astronomers too.
Terrestrial travel used to be dangerous but today we have recreational boaters crossing oceans for giggles. Aircraft use to be toys for the wealthy but (dedicated) hobbyists build them today and there could be many millions more if autonomous guidance and control systems displaced unreliable meatbags (which they largely do for many missions).
As navigation and control systems improve far beyond
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Re: Astronomy will eventually move to space (Score:1)
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Airplanes, Clouds, Birds. Somehow Starlink, whose satellites have precise orbits that can be predicted weeks in advance down to the millisecond, is more of a concern than AIRPLANES, CLOUDS, atmospheric phenomena, and BIRDS. Many of the people who are against this were are the same ones who blocked the Thirty-Meter Telescope from being built in Hawaii out of fake "cultural concerns." Well I am amazed they've switched careers from anthropology to astronomy. Most of the people who are against these satellites
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Not only that, but also for the p0rN benefits!
P0rN pollution (Score:2)
Well with a decreasing birth rate (till the pandemic forced people indoors) apparently people weren't getting the benefits of p0rN.
https://www.indexmundi.com/g/g... [indexmundi.com]
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how is birth rate a benefit to anyone? what a dumb metric.
Re:Sky pollution (Score:4, Interesting)
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Satellites reflect light, leaving bright streaks in your long exposure.
Starlink Reviewed (Score:3)
https://youtu.be/Fh1a2K9ZgNA
Great, I wonder how long before online... (Score:2)
Really hoping this brings coverage down to at least the middle band of the U.S., if not the south U.S. as well. It seems like current users have been pretty successful, so they could be close to expanding out the number of clients.
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Even the current band serving the beta doesn't quite have 100% coverage yet, though it's getting close. You can see live coverage maps here: https://satellitemap.space/ [satellitemap.space]
You can see that there are still just a few occasional gaps in the beta area, but you can also see how as more and more satellites get in orbit, the areas with good coverage will creep closer and closer to the equater.