As many as 40 Starlink satellites from Thursday’s SpaceX launch are set to smash back into Earth’s atmosphere and disintegrate in the atmosphere, according to a SpaceX update on Tuesday.
Last week, SpaceX sent 49 Starlink satellites up on a Falcon 9 from Kennedy Space Center in what is becoming a rather routine operation for Elon Musk’s spaceflight company. SpaceX has launched over 2,000 Starlink satellites since 2018 in an attempt to bring high-speed satellite internet to all corners of the globe —
and particularly those where access has typically been limited. But after launch on Thursday, a geomagnetic storm slammed into Earth’s atmosphere. Geomagnetic storms are caused by the sun spewing out solar wind particles that eventually crash into Earth.
The particles mess with the planet’s magnetic field and disrupt satellites, increasing drag and messing with their orbits. That’s exactly what happened to potentially 40 Starlink satellites just after they were deployed into their intended orbit, SpaceX has said.
The company’s announcement, posted on its website on Tuesday, said the satellites were stricken last Friday, Feb. 4, a day after they were launched to a preliminary “low-deployment” orbit about 130 miles (210 km) above Earth.
SpaceX said it routinely deploys its satellites to such low orbits at first so they can quickly and safely be allowed to fall back toward Earth and incinerate on re-entry if a malfunction is detected during initial system checkouts. But SpaceX left unclear whether the company had anticipated the severity of the extreme space weather conditions it faced, fueled by a solar storm days earlier, when it sent its latest batch of 49 satellites aloft.
