As per the latest reports, a geomagnetic storm has destroyed at least 40 of Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites that were launched last week, dealing a costly blow to the company.
SpaceX said it lost 40 of its 49 Starlink satellites to a geomagnetic storm that hit Earth last week, just days after launching a new batch of 49 Starlink satellites into Low Earth Orbit (LEO). On February 3, the satellites were launched on a Falcon-9 rocket, and the geomagnetic storm hit Earth the next day.
The result of when the Geomagnetic storm hit
The satellites dispatched on Thursday were badly hit by the geomagnetic storm on Friday. According to a SpaceX update, the storm has caused the atmosphere to warm and the atmospheric density at our low deployment altitudes to increase. As per the GPS data, the increased speed and severity of the storm caused atmospheric drag to increase by up to 50% compared to previous launches.
The Starlink team directed the satellites to enter a safe mode in which they would fly edge-on (like a sheet of paper) to reduce drag and thus “take cover from the storm.”
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SpaceX stated preliminary analysis shows that the increased drag at low altitudes prevented the satellites from exiting safe mode to begin orbit raising manoeuvres, and up to 40 of the satellites will re-enter or have already re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere.
According to the company, the de-orbiting satellites present “zero collision risk” with other satellites and, by design, die upon atmospheric re-entry, resulting in no orbital debris and no satellite parts falling to the ground.
“Unfortunately, the satellites launched on Thursday were severely impacted by a geomagnetic storm on Friday,” the company said.
SpaceX recently passed the 2,000 satellite launch milestone, and the company intends to launch a total of 12,000 such satellites to provide cheaper internet services to various parts of the world.
