Kessler syndrome is only a big problem for higher orbits where air drag is miniscule. Low-earth orbit refers to a rather large band of space below an altitude of 2,000 km. Objects at the upper end would be much more problematic than at the lower end, since atmospheric density falls off nearly exponentially with altitude.

SpaceX actually says that StarLink is deployed at 550km, much lower than normal.^[1] While this is to decrease latency, it also means their satellites will naturally fall out of the sky in 5 years without periodic boosting of altitude.

Even f Kessler happened at their altitude, we could all just wait a few years for the trash to fall out of the sky. In fact, the more everything smashes together into tiny pieces in said orbit, the faster the problem would solve itself after since as objects get smaller, their surface area to volume ratio increases, which means drag would affect them more per their mass.

Thx @knfrmity for some fellow rocketry knowledge. Just because Elon Musk is a capitalist pig doesn’t mean that his company’s evilness can transcend the laws of physics.

I do believe these satellite internet constellations in LEO are inevitable. They are a massive force multiplier for the military, and also provide insane soft power via low-cost internet across the globe. China is building their own Qianfan constellation to compete.

No company can control how their satellite falls, except in the general area of the Pacific Ocean. China has the same problem with deorbiting rocket stages.

There are plenty of other things to nail SpaceX on, such as blowing up Starship prototypes near populated areas without safety assessments, but this is not one of them. These Starlink satellites are being deorbited on purpose for retirement using the booster engine, but pointed to push them into the atmosphere. By doing so, SpaceX can make sure leftover debris lands in the Pacific, away from people.

Once the satellites are in low earth orbit, their future deorbiting is inevitable. Any concerns about vaporized satellite metals harming the atmosphere should have been assessed before putting them up there, though I don’t think anyone made noise about that issue until now.

I don’t think this counts as SpaceX’s fault. Y’all need to read up on how low-earth orbits work.

Satellites in low-earth orbit (e.g. the International Space Station) still encounter some air resistance. The atmosphere doesn’t just end; it technically continues out to the moon, thinning out along the way.

Previous kinds of satellite internet relied on satellites in geostationary orbit, which is far enough away from Earth for air resistance to be a non-issue. Unfortunately, they also suffer from time delay as internet signals travel between it and Earth.

SpaceX’s StarLink and China’s Qianfan solve this by placing satellite internet in low-Earth-orbit, removing the delay by being physically closer. ^[1]. However, you need thousands of low-orbit satellites to provide full internet coverage across the Earth because since each satellite is way closer to Earth, their antennas oversee way less land area.

Since they’re closer to Earth, they also experience significant air resistance which slows their orbit and will cause them to eventually fall down and burn up in the lower atmosphere. To prevent this, StarLink satellites have thrusters to re-boost their orbits. Once the fuel for them runs out though, they still have to fall down.

I’ve dabbled in this area as well. The problem seems to be that metal shops in the US are too small-scale and don’t have services to help walk customers through manufacturing. They expect you to know everything, and just tell them exactly where to punch, bend, and cut stuff.

Chinese factories don’t have this problem because they’re super used to dealing with unfamiliar customers. Unfortunately, there simply isn’t enough demand for most US manufacturing to support such services. It’s a chicken-and-egg problem. Not enough customers to afford baller customer service, and no good customer service to attract more customers.

There are some US companies that can do some of this. For example, SendCutSend is an all-online sheet metal fabrication company. By being online-first, they can get enough orders to support Design Services for customers. Unfortunately, they’re still not large-scale enough to help with assembly.