SpaceX Alleges a Chinese-Deployed Satellite Risked Colliding with Starlink (pcmag.com) 45
"A SpaceX executive says a satellite deployed from a Chinese rocket risked colliding with a Starlink satellite," reports PC Magazine:
On Friday, company VP for Starlink engineering, Michael Nicolls, tweeted about the incident and blamed a lack of coordination from the Chinese launch provider CAS Space. "When satellite operators do not share ephemeris for their satellites, dangerously close approaches can occur in space," he wrote, referring to the publication of predicted orbital positions for such satellites...
[I]t looks like one of the satellites veered relatively close to a Starlink sat that's been in service for over two years. "As far as we know, no coordination or deconfliction with existing satellites operating in space was performed, resulting in a 200 meter (656 feet) close approach between one of the deployed satellites and STARLINK-6079 (56120) at 560 km altitude," Nicolls wrote... "Most of the risk of operating in space comes from the lack of coordination between satellite operators — this needs to change," he added.
Chinese launch provider CAS Space told PCMag that "As a launch service provider, our responsibility ends once the satellites are deployed, meaning we do not have control over the satellites' maneuvers."
And the article also cites astronomer/satellite tracking expert Jonathan McDowell, who had tweeted that CAS Space's response "seems reasonable." (In an email to PC Magazine, he'd said "Two days after launch is beyond the window usually used for predicting launch related risks."
But "The coordination that Nicolls cited is becoming more and more important," notes Space.com, since "Earth orbit is getting more and more crowded." In 2020, for example, fewer than 3,400 functional satellites were whizzing around our planet. Just five years later, that number has soared to about 13,000, and more spacecraft are going up all the time. Most of them belong to SpaceX. The company currently operates nearly 9,300 Starlink satellites, more than 3,000 of which have launched this year alone.
Starlink satellites avoid potential collisions autonomously, maneuvering themselves away from conjunctions predicted by available tracking data. And this sort of evasive action is quite common: Starlink spacecraft performed about 145,000 avoidance maneuvers in the first six months of 2025, which works out to around four maneuvers per satellite per month. That's an impressive record. But many other spacecraft aren't quite so capable, and even Starlink satellites can be blindsided by spacecraft whose operators don't share their trajectory data, as Nicolls noted.
And even a single collision — between two satellites, or involving pieces of space junk, which are plentiful in Earth orbit as well — could spawn a huge cloud of debris, which could cause further collisions. Indeed, the nightmare scenario, known as the Kessler syndrome, is a debris cascade that makes it difficult or impossible to operate satellites in parts of the final frontier.
[I]t looks like one of the satellites veered relatively close to a Starlink sat that's been in service for over two years. "As far as we know, no coordination or deconfliction with existing satellites operating in space was performed, resulting in a 200 meter (656 feet) close approach between one of the deployed satellites and STARLINK-6079 (56120) at 560 km altitude," Nicolls wrote... "Most of the risk of operating in space comes from the lack of coordination between satellite operators — this needs to change," he added.
Chinese launch provider CAS Space told PCMag that "As a launch service provider, our responsibility ends once the satellites are deployed, meaning we do not have control over the satellites' maneuvers."
And the article also cites astronomer/satellite tracking expert Jonathan McDowell, who had tweeted that CAS Space's response "seems reasonable." (In an email to PC Magazine, he'd said "Two days after launch is beyond the window usually used for predicting launch related risks."
But "The coordination that Nicolls cited is becoming more and more important," notes Space.com, since "Earth orbit is getting more and more crowded." In 2020, for example, fewer than 3,400 functional satellites were whizzing around our planet. Just five years later, that number has soared to about 13,000, and more spacecraft are going up all the time. Most of them belong to SpaceX. The company currently operates nearly 9,300 Starlink satellites, more than 3,000 of which have launched this year alone.
Starlink satellites avoid potential collisions autonomously, maneuvering themselves away from conjunctions predicted by available tracking data. And this sort of evasive action is quite common: Starlink spacecraft performed about 145,000 avoidance maneuvers in the first six months of 2025, which works out to around four maneuvers per satellite per month. That's an impressive record. But many other spacecraft aren't quite so capable, and even Starlink satellites can be blindsided by spacecraft whose operators don't share their trajectory data, as Nicolls noted.
And even a single collision — between two satellites, or involving pieces of space junk, which are plentiful in Earth orbit as well — could spawn a huge cloud of debris, which could cause further collisions. Indeed, the nightmare scenario, known as the Kessler syndrome, is a debris cascade that makes it difficult or impossible to operate satellites in parts of the final frontier.
Cooperation Governments needed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Cooperation Governments needed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Cooperation Governments needed (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, a perfectly reasonable country, let's be friends!
But you guys share so many things in common. China and the USA are both dictatorships who ignore the courts or stuff them with regime friendly plants, you both do state takeover of businesses and the media, you both do extra territorial and extra judicial killings, you both send people who you ethnically don't like to concentration camps (though China at least does it in their own country), you both invade other's territorial waters, you both distort international trade, and strongarm other nations, you both suck Putins dick.
I mean the only difference between the USA and China at this point is skin colour.
Re:Cooperation Governments needed (Score:4, Informative)
Oh no sorry I was unfair saying that the only difference is skin colour. China is investing the green energy while the USA is just hell bent on destroying the planet. That is another difference.
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America has issues, but most won't be an issue in 3 years
Do you really believe you are going to get a free and fair election in 2028?
And even if you did, that MAGA would step down and accept the results, having tried to alter and ignore their last electoral loss, but this time with armed troops permanently patrolling D.C., with every American Flag Officer publicly informed by their CinC that disloyal U.S. citizens are the new Enemy #1, And the Judge Advocate General and every senior officer in their corps (the people who tell soldiers what is and isn't a legal o
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Other than the fact one is literally a communist totalitarian regime.
Fun fact. China is not literally communist, much like the USA is not literally a representative democracy. Both actually share that middle ground where people call them that despite in reality not working anything like it.
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Oh no, communists.
Re:Cooperation Governments needed (Score:5, Informative)
They are a communist totalitarian regime
wank wank flonk flonk [wikipedia.org]
doing ethnic purges not only historically but also RIGHT NOW
We're funding one not only historically but RIGHT NOW
openly preparing to invade their peaceful neighbour Taiwan
Venezuela, bitch.
operating the Great Firewall
Yeah, we don't have a great firewall, we just have unconstitutional citizen spying programs with taps on all backhaul links and points of ingress/egress.
implementing some absurdly Orwellian schemes like their Social Score thing
Wait until you find out about credit scores and employment or renting a home.
not to mention stealing all western IP they can lay their hands on
Yeah, we sent it to them so they could build us stuff, and our nation was very much founded on ignoring patents.
and abusing their trade dominance (rare earths anyone) in any way they can.
You mean the rare earths we stopped producing because we got them cheaper from China, and could be producing again but we don't want to? Oh yeah and tariffs.
My point here is not that any of this shit China is doing is great. My point is that we are doing all the same shit, and if you don't think so, you're a nationalistic dipshit with his head so far up his ass he can see out of his own mouth.
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doing ethnic purges not only historically but also RIGHT NOW
We're funding one not only historically but RIGHT NOW
Kind of, yes, and clearly we should stop, but this isn't the same thing. We're supporting an ally that has gone off the reservation, not doing the bad thing ourselves, and that distinction does matter.
openly preparing to invade their peaceful neighbour Taiwan
Venezuela, bitch.
Indeed. The US actions toward Venezuela are worse than China's against Taiwan.
operating the Great Firewall
Yeah, we don't have a great firewall, we just have unconstitutional citizen spying programs with taps on all backhaul links and points of ingress/egress.
That's true, and bad, but also completely different. China has much more intrusive spying of its own citizens plus actively and deliberately suppresses any kind of dissenting press (meaning shuts them down and throws them in jail or
Re: Cooperation Governments needed (Score:2)
You should get a dictionary so you can learn the difference between objective and subjective. Enjoy your ratio.
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- doing ethnic purges: Getting rid of all (non white) immigrants
- openly preparing to invade their peaceful neighbour: I'm looking at you Venezuela
- implementing some absurdly Orwellian schemes like their Social Score thing: Requiring all visitors to provide their social media for scoring and entrance
decision making. Also required for any/all federal positions
- stealing all western IP they can: Constantly using IP from musicians/performers at rallies and government social media accounts, even after they exp
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Let me be the first to acknowledge that my own
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It's interesting that the is news. I don't recall it being a big deal when the Chinese space station had to dodge a SpaceX satellite.
Re:Cooperation Governments needed (Score:5, Informative)
- China and the US both filed a brief with the UN (some it was somewhat of a big deal)
- Starlink did tell the State Department which apparently did not pass the information on (China doesn't seem to have notified the US in this case either)
- The information was apparently not passed on because it wasn't deemed a risk (bad decision) - The CSS did an anti-collision burn but the Starlink satellite also did an anti-collision burn (this satellite did not)
- The closest approach was about 1km (this satellite was 200m)
Neither should have happened and both should be a big deal but get out of here with this "but Starlink/US" nonsense.
https://www.thespacereview.com... [thespacereview.com]
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To be fair the risk here is to the Chinese satellite. Starlink is mostly a bunch of low cost space junk designed with a view of quantity over quality and with one of the shortest life expectancies of anything non-living we've put into space, and with a designed to fail orbital path shorter than some kids time in highschool.
This is not equivalent to the space station in the slightest.
Fial Frontier (Score:2)
If Earth orbit is the final frontier, then we are fucked as a species. Did AI write that?
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If Earth orbit is the final frontier, then we are fucked as a species. Did AI write that?
No.
Kessler did.
Any day now we’ll ignorantly validate it too.
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If Earth orbit is the final frontier, then we are fucked as a species. Did AI write that?
No.
Kessler did.
Any day now we’ll ignorantly validate it too.
We've seen the numbers - as noted, just 5 years ago, there were some 3400 satellites in orbit, now there are some 13,000. Oh yeah, and the orbiting debris. There simply will be collisions, and with these increasing numbers of satellites, it will turn into a group project.
The first Kessler event is not an if, it is a when.
True. Knew a few who worked at NORAD in the early 90s. They were tracking over 18,000 pieces in orbit back then.
It's not just the dark ages society will be plunged into. It's the fact that GenX will look like Australian outback survivalists by comparison to everyone else going through internet DTs contemplating their very existence because of a lack of likes. Crippling GPS alone is a nightmare for the generation who memorizes street signs like phone numbers.
Disposal fee? (Score:2)
What about if there is an international fee for deployment that is spent on clean-up bots? It's kind of like how cans, bottles, and electronics (some states) attach a disposal fee.
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Re: Disposal fee? (Score:2)
Er (Score:2)
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With over ten thousand of Starlink satellites (and 42,000 planned), I think everything up there is at risk of colliding with them. Hopefully they can keep them from colliding with each other.
The report is backwards! (Score:2)
"A SpaceX executive says a satellite deployed from a Chinese rocket risked colliding with a Starlink satellite,"
I think it's amazing that that a Chinese satellite was bale to avoid one of Musk's 8,000+ StarLink satellites!