Among other things, SpaceX said the FAA's debris estimates were based on a 23-year-old study of satellites that were made with different materials than Starlink satellites. SpaceX says its own satellites are designed to burn up completely when they reenter the atmosphere.
The FAA report to Congress did include a caveat that said, "If SpaceX is correct in reporting zero surviving debris, as SpaceX reports in FCC filings, and Starlink is a fully-demisable spacecraft, the rise in reentry risk is minimal over the current risk."
“If SpaceX is correcthonest in reporting zero surviving debris, as SpaceX reports in FCC filings, and Starlink is a fully-demisable spacecraft, the rise in reentry risk is minimal over the current risk.”
Yeah, I was going to say that there is no way that could be correct. There are only like 8000 satellites in orbit. There is no fucking way that small of a number is going to be hurting someone every couple years.
The people that put sats up have to calculate how every component will burn up in the atmosphere before they even get approval. Simply put, there's basically no chance of anyone dying from these things reentering the atmosphere.
Who wouldn't? They are doing some of the most advanced rocket science on the planet. Of course, trusting corporations statements and research is an entire topic of it's own.
Taking Elon Musk seriously on the other hand...
the text is showing hight probability of AI generation. Which adult human being is going to write eg: " In this article, we will discuss the FAA report in detail, including the risks posed by falling satellites, the causes of these risks, and the potential solutions to mitigate them." 🤖
it does not say anything else than this - much more likely human written thing here - only the original is only 1/3 as long. That is IMO how come the AI Writing is literraly jumping out on you from the article. 😱
Well, the chance isn't zero, but that example, being knocked out (disabled or destroyed) by an asteroid has never happened to any spacecraft, ever. Statically the chances of that happening are very very close to zero.
I recommend you never buy a lottery ticket - because clearly you don't understand how luck works.
If a satellite were to smash through the roof of my office and land harmlessly on the floor, I reckon I'd be quite startled and might bump my knee on the bottom of the desk...
There's definitely a risk of injury, and you're far more likely to be injured than killed.
I'd probably also have to pay a couple hundred thousand dollars to repair my home, since I don't think insurance covers falling satellites and I'm certainly not going to try and sue a company on the other side of the world when they probably didn't do anything against the law anyway. Bruised knee would be the least of my problems.
the probability that the satellite debris will not be completely burned during the fall and cause injury or death to people on the ground is 0.6 per year. This means it would happen once every two years
That doesn’t mean it will fucking hit someone. The surface area of the planet is 510e12 m^2. There are about 8B people on the planet. Even if we conservatively assume that everyone is lying flat on their back in the middle of an open field, that’s only about 8B m^2 of vulnerable surface area. At that rate, you’d expect an injury interval of 510e12 / 8e9 / 0.6 = 1 injury every 106 thousand years. Yes there is some correlation of common orbits and human population, so we can be conservative and put it at 50,000 years.
So far, no one has ever been killed by a meteorite. There's been a scary injury, some unconfirmed rumors and at least one engine block was cracked in half.
That said, death by thing falling from space is totally how I want to die. Bonus points if I'm totally disintegrated and just MIA. ( Circuitboard. It was man made. Has anyone seen Uriel? ) A falling satellite will be fine.