[4K] Solar Wind Purifies the Earth Musk's 40 Starlink Starlink satellites were buried in a magnetic storm

The geomagnetic event caused Starlink emitters to float back into Earth's atmosphere, where they would burn up, potentially costing the company about $100 million.

Over the past three years, SpaceX has deployed thousands of satellites into low-Earth orbit as part of its business of transmitting high-speed internet services from space. But the company's latest deployment of 49 new satellites since its Feb. 3 launch did not go as planned.

The incident highlighted the dangers faced by many companies planning to send tens of thousands of small satellites into orbit to provide internet services from space. More solar eruptions could shoot some of these newly deployed orbital launchers out of the sky. The Sun has an 11-year cycle that oscillates between overactive and stationary states. For now, it is accelerating to its peak and is expected to arrive around 2025.

By solar standards, recent solar showers have been relatively mild. Hugh Lewis, a space debris expert at the University of Southampton in the UK, said: "I am fully confident that we will see extreme events in the next cycle as this is usually what happens during the maximum solar activity. "If the milquetoast eruption could destroy 40 Starlink satellites suspended at low orbital altitudes, then a more powerful solar scream has the potential to cause more damage to the giant constellations of SpaceX and other companies."

SpaceX announced in a company blog post On Tuesday night that it was about to destroy as many as 40 of its satellites. After launch, the company said, the satellite was released into a predetermined orbit about 130 miles from Earth.

Part of the reason for choosing this altitude is to prevent potential future collisions with other satellites. If a satellite fails after deployment at that altitude and cannot lift its orbit to a safer altitude, "the atmosphere will quickly reclaim the failed technology," Dr Lewis said. "It's a very good safety measure."

But on Jan. 29, before the satellites launched, a violent eruption of high-energy particles and magnetic forces from the sun, known as coronal mass ejections, was detected. That jet reached Earth sometime around February 2, creating a magnetic storm in Earth's magnetic bubbles.

Powerful storms add kinetic energy to particles in Earth's atmosphere. "So the atmosphere is a little bit bloated, inflated," Dr. Lewis said. This expansion leads to an increase in the density of the atmosphere, which in turn increases the drag experienced by objects passing through it, including satellites. This resistance shrinks the size of their orbits, bringing them closer to the thick, low-level atmospheres they burn.

According to SpaceX, in a recent Starlink deployment, "the speed and severity of the storm's escalation resulted in a 50 percent increase in atmospheric drag than previous launches." "This ensures that as many as 40 of the 49 satellites will eventually succumb to gravity and perish."

But Dr. Lewis said, "If the launch cost is included, it could result in up to $100 million in hardware costs." ”

The dangers posed by solar eruptions and geomagnetic storms to objects in low Earth orbit, ranging from electrical damage to communications disruptions, are well known. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's rating of geomagnetic storms ranges from mild to extreme. The agency noted that the latest "moderate" storm could cause a change in atmospheric resistance, which could change the orbit.

Knowing these risks, did SpaceX take this risk into account during its Starlink deployment?

"I'm a bit dumbfounded," said Samantha Laulor, an astronomer at the University of Regina in Canada. "Really? They didn't think of that? ”