twenty Starlink The satellites were launched prematurely during a failed SpaceX rocket launch last week – and now, observations have confirmed that they all burned up in the upper atmosphere after falling back to Earth. Experts are currently investigating what happened, and the rockets responsible will remain on the ground until that investigation is complete.
On July 11, SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 10:35 p.m. ET, a day later than originally planned. The launch initially went as expected and the rocket’s first stage successfully separated from the satellite-laden second stage, before landing on a drone ship in the Pacific Ocean. However, the second phase then failed to complete the second burn due to a leak of liquid oxygen, leaving it trapped in low Earth orbit. (It is currently unclear whether the leak caused the delayed launch.)
The second stage of the rocket was still able to release its payload. However, the satellites were stuck in an elliptical orbit around our planet, with a minimum altitude of 84 miles (135 kilometers) – about half the altitude at which they normally operate. At this altitude, atmospheric drag slowed the satellites and they began to fall back to Earth at about 3 miles (5 km) each completed orbit, SpaceX representatives wrote in a. STATEMENT on July 11.
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“At this level of pull, our maximum available thrust is unlikely to be sufficient to successfully lift the satellites,” SpaceX representatives wrote. “As such, the satellites will re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere and disappear completely.”
The company gained control of most of the satellites and ordered them to burn at their maximum thrust, known as warp 9, in a last-ditch effort to regain altitude. Space News reported. But this was not enough to save the satellites.
Later observations from Jonathan McDowellan astrophysicist at Harvard University, has since confirmed that all 20 satellites met a fiery death on July 12, Spaceweather.com reported.
The reentry spacecraft “posed no threat to other satellites in orbit or to public safety,” SpaceX representatives wrote. And so far, there have been no reports of the spacecraft reaching Earth’s surface, according to Spaceweather.com.
It was the first Falcon 9 launch failure since 2016 and the largest single loss of Starlink satellites since February 2022, when a the geomagnetic storm knocked 40 satellites out of the sky shortly after the satellites were placed in Earth orbit.
SpaceX is now investigating what happened, under the supervision of the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Live Science’s sister site Space.com reported. The company will not be able to launch any more Falcon 9 rockets until this investigation is completed.
SpaceX’s Starship interplanetary rocket was similarly based by the FAA in 2023 behind her exploded minutes after takeoff during the first test flight on April 20 last year.
It’s currently unclear how long the Falcon 9 rockets will be on the ground. But an unnamed industry expert told Space News that the spacecraft could be grounded for months, which — if correct — would force a major reshuffle of the company’s launch schedule for the rest of the year.