July 2018
Rediscovering UK sovereign launch capability
... in small satellite payloads being launched into low Earth orbit (LEO). At the forefront of this is the mega constellation revolution, whereby large, expensive satellites are replaced with fleets of easily replaced smallsats. A private plane on the...
04 September 2019
A near miss as ESA and SpaceX satellites nearly collide
.... The perpetrator was Starlink44 – one of the first 60 satellites recently launched by SpaceX as part of its 12 000 strong mega constellation. The rest SpaceX hopes to have in place by mid-2020. The potential ‘conjunction’ was expected to occur...
April 2020
Spaceport Cornwall – from protests to sustainability
... industry cannot simply sit back and continue with the status quo. General public concerns over mega-constellations, new commercial spaceports being proposed in rural areas and space debris are all of increasing interest to the...
March 2021
Space weather and risk mitigation
... do not have strong interdependencies, but the situation is changing swiftly with the appearance of the satellite mega-constellations. Open access to data collected in the Sentinel missions - notably Sentinel 1 (pictured) and Sentinel 2 – has changed...
March 2021
Eyes on the prize
... the UK cannot focus on incremental gains. Disruptive opportunities are arising, including micro-launchers, miniaturisation, robotics, mega-constellations, and growing demand for satellite communications and Earth observation data from new AI-driven...
January 2023
Space sustainability imperative
... Fragile Space took me to the top of volcanoes in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, clean rooms across Europe, mega-constellation launches on both coasts of the United States within a few days of each other, and a farm in England. It also...
