Up to 40 of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites are expected to fall out of orbit thanks to some inopportune timing - the company launched the satellites directly into a solar storm. 7NEWS
SpaceX has not shared how much it costs to build a Starlink satellite, though the company’s president, Gwynne Shotwell, said in 2019 that the price was well below $1 million apiece.
SpaceX has said it will eventually need as many as 42,000 satellites, all working in co-ordination to blanket the globe in connectivity, in order to deliver high-speed, uninterrupted service.It’s not clear why SpaceX chose to move forward with the February 3 launch given that space weather trackers already knew the storm was on the way.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifts off from Pad 39A at Kennedy Space Centre carrying a batch of Starlink satellites.“Different companies have their own criteria” for deciding whether or not a space weather event will impact their launch, said Bill Murtagh, the program co-ordinator at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Centre said.