this post was submitted on 22 Dec 2024
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Oh boy.
I'm generally pro space technology, but I hope SpaceX learns the hard way that a constellation like this isn't physically possible and makes everyone else cancel their planned ones. Best case scenario they create kessler syndrome and ground every spacecraft on Earth until enough debris comes back down (shouldn't take more than a year at their altitude) and it sparks some kind of international outrage/UN regulation against megaconstellations.
I am also pro space technology, which is exactly why I hate SpaceX.
A rich morons ego project that is setting space exploration back decades with light pollution and space tourism and on course to cause a Kessler syndrome.
These people aren't scientists. They're the John Hammond's of space technology.
"I'll tell you the problem with the scientific power that you're using here: it didn't require any discipline to attain it. You read what others had done and you took the next step. You didn't earn the knowledge for yourselves, so you don't take any responsibility for it. You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could and before you even knew what you had you patented it and packaged it and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now you're selling it, you want to sell it!"
Explain
Sorry, I mean John Hammond lmao. Fixed
I believe OP means JOHN Hammond because the quote is from the Jurassic Park novel about that character. He was played by Richard Attenborough in the movie.
This is correct I am stupid and combined the actor and characters names lmao
I'd love Musk and Bezos to experience the Richard Hammond rocket which turns into a spinning, flaming fuselage after 5 seconds of acceleration
More enthusiasm than sense and they're prone to crashing?
The worst part is they're doing stuff other organizations already solved. The reverse booster/thruster thing Musk wants was accomplished by the soviets back in the late '70s IIRC. They came to the conclusion it was safer and cheaper to just have people land how we've been doing it since the beginning. NASA reviewed their findings and agreed with the soviets, so we have never pursued it.
But big brain bazinga boy has to have his Trek War Cyberpunkerino, so now government subsidies are siphoned away from actual research to whatever this shit is.
More than that, I wouldn't say no to some Kessler syndrome in a higher orbit. We need a few generations to get our shit together down here on Earth
I'm not convinced Kessler Syndrome is physically possible in higher orbits - at least not without getting asteroid mining involved. The higher you go the longer it would theoretically last but also the more debris you would need to create it.
those satellites burning up aren't benign
https://research.noaa.gov/2023/10/16/noaa-scientists-link-exotic-metal-particles-in-the-upper-atmosphere-to-rockets-satellites/
One of my fears is that it creates a race, China's already working on a large internet constellation themselves. Because if they don't, they let Elon Musk control internet communication in low Earth orbit.
It's the tragedy of the Commons all over again. China probably doesn't want to spend billions of dollars flooding low earth orbit with internet satellites, but they can't sit back and let musk and bezos do it unilaterally. I assume they were content with whatever international organizations handed out lower earth orbits, until apartheid baby decided to eat up every space he could