SpaceX Adds Laser Links To Starlink Satellites To Serve Earth's Polar Areas (arstechnica.com) 48
SpaceX has begun launching Starlink satellites with laser links that will help provide broadband coverage in polar regions. As SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wrote on Twitter on Sunday, these satellites "have laser links between the satellites, so no ground stations are needed over the poles." From a report: The laser links are included in 10 Starlink satellites just launched into polar orbits. The launch came two weeks after SpaceX received Federal Communications Commission approval to launch the 10 satellites into polar orbits at an altitude of 560km. "All sats launched next year will have laser links," Musk wrote in another tweet yesterday, indicating that the laser systems will become standard on Starlink satellites in 2022. For now, SpaceX is only including laser links on polar satellites. "Only our polar sats have lasers this year & are v0.9," Musk wrote. Alaskan residents will benefit from the polar satellites, SpaceX told the FCC in an application to change the orbit of some of its satellites in April 2020.
Cameras (Score:4, Insightful)
He should put a small camera in each satellite too .. nothing with crazy zoom .. but good enough for real time weather/3D cloud imaging. Something that will be better than what the GOES satellites can do would be nice.
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"He should put a small camera in each satellite too .. nothing with crazy zoom .. but good enough for real time weather/3D cloud imaging"
On the upper side as well, so he can shut up the astronomers on earth.
Sure. For "Communication". (Score:3)
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If a 250kg satellite with a laser could be weapon that would be amazing advancement and our energy problems would be solved. What does it run on, fusion or matter/antimatter?
Three clicks of the cap arms its four-second fuse, (Score:2)
Three clicks of the cap arms its four-second fuse, another three disarms it.
Not funny (Score:2)
Three clicks of the cap arms its four-second fuse, another fifty clicks disarms it.
FTFY
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That's definitely the only reason I can think of to put a "LASER" on a satellite! No other reason at all, nope!
What do you think a secret phase conjugate tracking system is for?
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Your well placed 80s movie reference has been noted. Alas I have no mod points.
In related news ... (Score:2, Funny)
The laser links are included in 10 Starlink satellites just launched into polar orbits.
A source reported that those satellites also contain a supply of shark chow.
Mr. Musk didn't respond to our request for comment.
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I just want satellites with frickin' lasers on their foreheads. And all I get is comet fragments. They're ill tempered, so that's a start.
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Awww someone modded you overrated. What a douche.
Hopefully some other mods come along with underrated so you don't lose karma for no good reason.
Sounds great for emergency beacon (Score:4, Interesting)
Sometimes when I'm in really remote locations, I take with me a device that I can use to send emergency messages via satellite... it would be great if I could get a similar device that used the StarLink network as it might offer more bandwidth to send out basically a destress message and GPS coordinates as the current devices do.
Not sure how portable a Starlink communications device could get, but assuming it would require a pretty clear view of the sky I am hopeful I could get something cheaper and better performing.
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No real need for this for safety beacons, they already do what you describe. Depending on the system, they either piggyback on polar weather satellites, geostationary satellites, or in the case of something like an InReach, OrbCOM or Iridium.
COPAS/SARSAT (the system used by PLBs (land based), EPIRBs (Marine usage), and whatever the Aeronautical standard is, are already well defined, have full Search and Rescue infrastructure behind them, and will get you help ASAP.
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PLBs (land based), EPIRBs (Marine usage),
Minor correction. PLBs also work for Marine applications. The difference is that an EPIRB is typically mounted to a vessel, while a PLB Is used for, well, persons.
Many PLBs are water certified and will float. This has even saved people's lives after an airplane crash in the water.
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The InReach etc. devices are very expensive to maintain service if all you really want is a beacon for a true emergency (which
Still think a StarLink device might be better (Score:1)
No real need for this for safety beacons, they already do what you describe.
Yes I have one (Bivy Stick, more a PLB instead of a satellite messenger) and it works OK, but I have a feeling a StarLink device might be better.
Surely the StarLink system is easier to hit than Iridium or the other satellites? SO it seems like a device could either have improved size, or battery duration for sending frequent location updates.
Along with that, with a limited data feed it seems like service should be cheaper. Some de
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"it would be great if I could get a similar device that used the StarLink network as it might offer more bandwidth to send out basically a destress message and GPS coordinates as the current devices do."
Use an (illegal) military one, you'll go to jail for sure, if you use it, but it's better than being dead for the rest of your life.
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Use an (illegal) military one, you'll go to jail for sure
Or you could ues a legal one [garmininreach.shop].
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One hiccup with that idea: Starlink base stations are reportedly the size of a pizza box. It is, at present, meant to be a fixed installation.
Also, as other people have already pointed out, the kind of device you describe already exists. Besides: just how much bandwidth do you need to send out a mayday
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Starlink is portable enough (pizza box size), but your issue might be carrying power for it everywhere. An ideal emergency beacon should use as little power as possible, preferably solar or a hand crank in case you forget to charge it.
Satellites with frickin' laser beams on their head (Score:2)
Antarctic (Score:5, Interesting)
They are talking about coverage in the arctic but to me the most exciting is proper coverage at the antarctic.
Scientific bases in the antarctic have a piss poor communication scheme, even the ones from the richest countries like the US and UK, where they can only transfer data at specific slots of time and the bandwidth is limited, to the point that that black-hole interferometry image done a couple of years ago took a lot longer than needed because they had to wait for the physical hard drives to be shipped from the south pole. Having coverage 24/7 with high bandwidth will not only make the life of the people working there more bearable, but will allow for more science.
Of course the astronomers will complain about the constellation on their images, but the cat is already out of the bag.
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"They are talking about coverage in the arctic but to me the most exciting is proper coverage at the antarctic."
I see. You scientists on those bases will play video-games until the doctor comes.
I guess, in the future, there will be more people willing to go to such stations for months, if they can zoom just like we all from home.
A solitary Antarctic Research station is immediately something else, with Netflix, Amazon, Hulu et al. don't you think?
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Just a bit of trivia, almost all of the images were shipped on gigantic piles of hard drives running in inert gasses. There was just too much data to transfer any other way.
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/n... [nasa.gov]
As each telescope acquired data from the target black hole, the digitized data and time stamp were recorded on computer disk media. Gathering data for four days around the world gave the team a substantial amount of data to process. The recorded media were then physically transported to a central locatio
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This country is like an airplane, and the passengers noticed that it was flying erratically. They check the cockpit and find that somehow the plane is being piloted not by a human being, but by a rabid orangutan. Of course panic ensues. The passengers start texting their loved ones about their impending demise.
Luckily, after a bit of a struggle, the orangutan is finally subdued and hauled out of the cockpit. A qualified pilot happens to be on board, and takes over the controls. Not surprisingly, even though
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I call BS
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There has not been any noticeable change in tone on Slashdot in the last six days, let alone enough change that you could say that it has "completely changed". You're spouting a bunch of hyperbolic nonsense. I'm pretty sure that you wanted to do it six days ago, but had the basic sense to realize it was too soon. You apparently couldn't even make it a week.
Re: Has anyone else noticed... (Score:2)
Could be there is now a president in office that isn't a nutter, listens to science and experts instead of sycophants, and has an actual plan vs. being dismissive of the pandemic and primarily wondering how it affects his ratings. Most of the outrage, and thus posts, was because bad shit is happening and 45 was ignoring it, and not taking real action that was in his power and purview to address.
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Pandemic has passed xxx,xxx deaths articles tend to happen at milestones like 400,000. The next major one would be 500,000, which should come around the middle of February. Then there's 600,000. 660,000 is also a milestone because that's when around one in every 500 people in the US has died from it and so forth. But since no milestone of particular note has been hit in those six days, there obviously would not be an article announcing it. I don't recall Slashdot generally noting new records in individual s
Mesh networking (Score:4, Insightful)
In other words, they have mesh networking capability between satellites. Once these news models reach sufficient numbers, it will be theoretically possible for Starlink to allow a person anywhere on earth to communicate with another person anywhere else on earth, utilizing only Starlink hardware. AKA Starlink's private LAN that happens to cover the entire planet.
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AKA Starlink's private LAN that happens to cover the entire planet.
Wouldn't that be "private GAN" (as in global)?
And so it begins (Score:2)
And so it begins...a few years from now Musk will be threatening to use his Orbital Laser Platform Array to bake Cleveland to a smoking crisp if they don't give him "a meelion dollars and a date with Miley Cyrus" or whatever.
You laugh now, but you will all bow before King Musk!
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WHOOOOSH!