Geomagnetic storm burns 40 Starlink satellites

Forty out of the 49 satellites Elon Musk's SpaceX sent into orbit last week were wiped out by a geomagnetic storm on Friday, a day after they were launched to a low deployment orbit, 130 miles above Earth. The incident was believed to mark the largest collective loss of satellites stemming from a single geomagnetic event and was unique in the way it unfolded, Harvard-Smithsonian astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell said on Wednesday. The Starlink satellites were launched on Feb. 3 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and with an intended orbit 130 miles above Earth. 

"Unfortunately, the satellites deployed on Thursday were significantly impacted by a geomagnetic storm on Friday," the statement said. The storm caused the atmospheric drag to increase by 50% than previous launches, and the Starlink team tried to put the satellites in safe mode to “take cover from the storm.” But the drag from the storm prevented more than 80% of the satellites from reaching their destination, according to Tuesday's update.

Elon Musk's company has issued a statement saying that there is "virtually" no risk as the satellites are built without any dense metallic components and should burn up entirely without pushing anything down on Earth. The company said there is "zero collision risk" with other satellites as 40 satellites are reentering or already entered Earth's atmosphere. No debris is expected to hit the ground.SpaceX deploys its satellites into these lower orbits so that in the very rare case any satellite does not pass initial system checkouts it will quickly be deorbited by atmospheric drag. While the low deployment altitude requires more capable satellites at a considerable cost to us, it’s the right thing to do to maintain a sustainable space environment, it said.