Mildly Interesting

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[–] P00ptart@lemmy.world 27 points 7 months ago (4 children)

Those are in very low earth orbit, basically they can only take out themselves.

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[–] BurgerBaron@piefed.social 4 points 7 months ago (1 child)

And the Ozone layer again, potentially.

https://www.science.org/content/article/burned-satellites-are-polluting-atmosphere

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[–] P00ptart@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago

Yay... Didn't know that

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[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago (1 child)

Yes, but collisions can always accelerate parts and new debris, bringing them to a higher orbit.

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[–] turmacar@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago*

But a more eccentric one, no collision is going to waive away orbital mechanics.

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[–] dan1101@lemmy.world 12 points 7 months ago (3 children)

If a cascading series of obliterations happens I could see us being trapped on Earth until some sort of technology is developed to navigate the debris field. Such idiocy allowing things like Starlink to begin with.

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[–] herrvogel@lemmy.world 14 points 7 months ago

They're in such a low orbit that they're barely staying in space already. You could explode all Starlink satellites right now and all their debris would naturally fall back into the atmosphere and leave the orbit clean in just a few years at most.

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[–] teyrnon@sh.itjust.works 4 points 7 months ago (1 child)

Trapped on earth? Just where do you think we are going to go? Contrary to what you have been told, we are no where near colonizing mars. Or cloud cities on venus, which is more practicable it appears to me. Society will fall apart long before we get there, glances at clock...

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[–] neukenindekeuken@sh.itjust.works 10 points 7 months ago

I don't know if this is what the guy you're replying to meant, but I would also say that not being able to launch new satalites for things like GPS, internet, communications systems, telescopes, space missions, etc. would also qualify as trapping us on earth.

They're our eyes and ears in space, and we use them to work around needing to navigate the terrain on earth to communicate. It's always easier to bounce a signal off satellites than traverse ground terrain.

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[–] Thorned_Rose@sh.itjust.works 16 points 7 months ago (1 child)

Starlink is space junk to start with.

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[–] 956@piefed.social 8 points 7 months ago

It's hard to say that unequivocally; I have family members who's internet options are HughesNet, where they get data caps and speeds approaching a whopping 1mbps on a good day, 5g coverage that hardly works, or Starlink. Starlink has worked for them leeeaaaguesss better than any other option they have.

Doesn't change the issues with the company or Elon, though. It just sucks that they are the only currently viable solution.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/apr/01/as-satellites-fill-earths-orbit-the-space-race-risks-becoming-an-environmental-crisis

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[–] MrsDoyle@sh.itjust.works 2 points 7 months ago

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[–] teyrnon@sh.itjust.works 2 points 7 months ago (6 children)

Good. Let the motherfuckers burn. There is no benefit to working people to these satellites. I hope a cascade of space junk takes out every single one of these low orbit bullshit nazi internet satellites.

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[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago (5 children)

Problem is that this space junk hits normal satellites, too.

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[–] teyrnon@sh.itjust.works -3 points 7 months ago (4 children)

Okay but what are these normal satellites doing for us? Spying on foreigners so we can kill them for Israel? Or what? Navigation on our stupid fucking cars we shouldn't even be driving? Fuck them all burn them all down.

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[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 6 points 7 months ago (3 children)

You don't like weather forecasts? Or analyzing ground quality and fertility? Not all satellites are evil.

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[+] teyrnon@sh.itjust.works -6 points 7 months ago* (2 children)

That can be done from the ground, and they are cancelling all of that shit as we speak, in the US, and your shit western sycophant governments will be following suit.

Analyzing ground and fertility is a new one to me. But on the ground it's easy to do that, easier. Why would we need to do that from space? That on second thought is the ~~dumbest~~ a dumb thing I've heard today that is no where near the dumbest thing I've heard, because, you know.

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[–] herrvogel@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago (1 child)

It's not easier to that on the ground. Those analyses are done by large radars slapped on top of satellites. They can scan huge tracts of land in very quickly with very high precision. More precise than airborne systems. They work regardless of the weather. The same satellites can keep track of river flows, forest growths, volcanic and tectonic activity, floods, structures like bridges, whole bunch of things. They can be used for extremely accurate mapping. They are insanely useful tools.

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[–] teyrnon@sh.itjust.works 0 points 7 months ago

While that may be the case, what makes you think the governments will allow those good uses to continue? Have you not seen the trajectory of our governments? They will only bring us bad things. And the private sector especially so. The government, the private sector, they are the enemy. This is not 1960. This is not 1960. Shiiiiiiiite, in clay davis' voice.

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[–] Steamymoomilk@sh.itjust.works -2 points 7 months ago (2 children)

The actual name of this phenomenon is "the Kepler effect"

Its where the decades of space junk, grow to such a degree that they keep hitting other satellites and becomes the equivalent of a pinball machine with other satellites.

Its a big issue many have tried to solve

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[–] bandwidthcrisis@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

It's Kessler Syndrome, in case anyone wants to read up on it.

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[–] buddascrayon@lemmy.world 1 point 7 months ago

Ok hear me out... MAGNETS

Hundreds of em all in a big ball. Tie it to a counterweight and then spin that fucker through lower orbit like a skip-it and soak up all the debris!

Nothing could possibly go wrong.

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[+] minorkeys@lemmy.world 23 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

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[–] gibmiser@lemmy.world 13 points 7 months ago

Pew pew motherfucker

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[–] Barbarian@sh.itjust.works 10 points 7 months ago

If you stroke me out, I'll become more powerful than you think, or whatever.

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[–] magnetosphere@fedia.io 18 points 7 months ago

“…But I’d like to hear more about why they assess the risk to be zero.”

Because it’s the company responsible that’s assessing the risk, you sweet summer child.

RUD: https://www.wordorigins.org/big-list-entries/rapid-unplanned-disassembly-rud

[–] fubarx@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago (1 child)

[–] bandwidthcrisis@lemmy.world 1 point 7 months ago

That reminds me of the term Lithobraking.

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[–] BiggestPiggest@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

The front fell off.

[–] A_norny_mousse@piefed.zip 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

Doesn't this happen all the time?

And even more so with Starlink satellites?

[–] Shrubbery@piefed.social 7 points 7 months ago (1 child)

Only when the satellite goes out of the environment.

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[–] webp@mander.xyz 2 points 7 months ago

sus...

[–] fiatcode@lemmy.ml 2 points 7 months ago (1 child)

I thought we had Boris the Animal killed

[–] dotCody@lemmy.world 1 point 7 months ago

It's just Boris!

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[–] fartographer@lemmy.world 1 point 7 months ago

Don't look up

[–] bitwolf@sh.itjust.works 1 point 7 months ago

I wish govts would stop Starlink from happening.

It seems like an apocalypse contributor with all that could go wrong. And I can't really see how it could ever outperform terrestrial 5g mesh networks or fiber.