SpaceX公司一次發(fā)射數(shù)十顆衛(wèi)星可能導致軌道交通堵塞

SpaceX公司一次發(fā)射數(shù)十顆衛(wèi)星可能導致軌道交通堵塞

SpaceX successfully launched 60 communications satellites on Monday using a single rocket.
周一，SpaceX用一枚火箭成功發(fā)射了60顆通信衛(wèi)星。

It's the second time in less than a year that Elon Musk's company has made such a launch, marking a dramatic increase in the number of satellites in orbit.

這是埃隆·馬斯克的公司在不到一年的時間里第二次進行這樣的發(fā)射，標志著在軌衛(wèi)星數(shù)量的大幅增加。

Over the next year, SpaceX and a rival company, OneWeb, plan to put hundreds of networked satellites in orbit to eventually provide high-speed Internet to any point on Earth. But critics worry that lax regulations, poor infrastructure and Musk's go-fast ethos could lead to chaos.

明年，SpaceX和競爭對手OneWeb計劃將數(shù)百顆聯(lián)網(wǎng)衛(wèi)星送入軌道，最終為地球上各處提供高速互聯(lián)網(wǎng)。但批評人士擔心，松懈的監(jiān)管、糟糕的基礎設施和馬斯克的急躁精神可能會導致混亂。

"If things break in space, it's pretty difficult to solve that problem," says Tim Farrar, president of TMF Associates, a consulting and research firm in satellite communications. "It's not like your car breaking down on the side of the road."

衛(wèi)星通信咨詢和研究公司TMF 聯(lián)合公司的總裁蒂姆•法勒表示:“如果太空中發(fā)生了爆炸，這個問題就很難解決。”“這不像你的車在路邊拋錨。”

In a statement to NPR, SpaceX said it believes the network can operate safely. "Starlink is on the leading edge of on-orbit debris mitigation, meeting or exceeding all regulatory and industry standards," the company says.

SpaceX公司在向美國國家公共電臺(NPR)發(fā)表的一份聲明中表示，它相信該網(wǎng)絡可以安全運行。該公司表示:“Starlink在減少在軌碎片方面處于領先地位，達到或超過了所有監(jiān)管和行業(yè)標準。”

Broken-down satellites, or what's left of them, are already a big problem, particularly in low-Earth orbit, where SpaceX's Starlink network is being deployed. The European Space Agency estimated in January that there are nearly a million pieces of space junk larger than 1 centimeter (about three-eighths of an inch) circling the planet.

出故障的衛(wèi)星，或者說它們的殘余物，已經(jīng)是一個大問題，尤其是在近地軌道，SpaceX的Starlink網(wǎng)絡正在那里部署。歐洲航天局1月份估計，環(huán)繞地球的太空垃圾超過1厘米(約八分之三英寸)，約有100萬顆。

SpaceX says it's planning 24 more launches next year, adding to this already crowded space environment. In September, ESA's Aeolus Earth observation satellite was forced to fire its maneuvering thrusters to avoid a potential collision with one of the Starlink satellites launched in May.

SpaceX公司表示，他們計劃明年再發(fā)射24枚火箭，這將使本已擁擠的太空環(huán)境雪上加霜。今年9月，歐洲航天局的Aeolus地球觀測衛(wèi)星被迫啟動機動推進器，以避免與5月份發(fā)射的Starlink衛(wèi)星發(fā)生潛在碰撞。

At the time, Holger Krag, head of the Space Debris Office at ESA, called the incidentan example of how "in the absence of traffic rules and communication protocols, collision avoidance depends entirely on the pragmatism of the operators involved."

當時，歐空局太空碎片辦公室的負責人霍爾格·克拉克(Holger Krag)稱，這起事故是一個例子，說明“在沒有交通規(guī)則和通信協(xié)議的情況下，避免碰撞完全取決于相關運營商的務實態(tài)度”。

But that hasn't dissuaded Musk, whose ambitious goal is to put 1,600 satellites in orbit to get truly global coverage for SpaceX's broadband service, with 400 to 800 needed to start service, Farrar says.

但這并沒有阻止馬斯克，他雄心勃勃的目標是將1600顆衛(wèi)星送入軌道，為SpaceX的寬帶服務實現(xiàn)真正的全球覆蓋，需要400到800顆衛(wèi)星才能開始服務，法勒說。

Ultimately, the space could grow to as many as 30,000 satellites, according to SpaceX filings to regulators. By contrast, there are only about 2,000 satellites in operation today.

SpaceX提交給監(jiān)管機構的文件顯示，最終，太空可能會發(fā)展到多達3萬顆衛(wèi)星。相比之下，目前只有大約2000顆衛(wèi)星在運行。

Farrar says the project is all about SpaceX's bottom line. The company is valued at about $30 billion, but its revenues are just a small fraction of that.

法勒說，這個項目完全是為了SpaceX的利潤。該公司的市值約為300億美元，但其收入只是其中的一小部分。

"If it's just going to justify that valuation it's going to have to generate an awful lot more revenue in the future, and the only realistic way to do that in the next few years is to get in the communications business with Starlink," Farrar says.

Farrar表示:“如果只是為了證明這個估值是合理的，那么未來它將必須產(chǎn)生更多的收入，而在未來幾年實現(xiàn)這一目標的唯一現(xiàn)實途徑就是與Starlink合作，進入通信業(yè)務領域。”

So SpaceX is moving quickly. It's planning to launch 60 more satellites soon, and more shortly after that. Meanwhile, OneWeb says it will launch more than 30 satellites each month starting next year.

因此，SpaceX正在迅速行動。它計劃不久之后再發(fā)射60顆衛(wèi)星，不久之后還會發(fā)射更多。與此同時，OneWeb表示，從明年開始，每月將發(fā)射30多顆衛(wèi)星。

"The scale of these systems is unprecedented," says Hugh Lewis, an orbital debris expert at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom who has worked as a consultant for OneWeb.

“這些系統(tǒng)的規(guī)模是前所未有的，”英國南安普頓大學軌道碎片專家、OneWeb顧問休·劉易斯說。

Lewis says all these new satellites could increase the chances of collisions that would spread shrapnel throughout low-Earth orbit.

劉易斯說，所有這些新衛(wèi)星都可能增加碰撞的機會，使碎片散布在近地軌道上。

How big of a problem this might be is unclear, he says, because no one has ever tried something like this before. To try to find out, he has been running simulations.

他說，這個問題到底有多大還不清楚，因為以前從來沒有人嘗試過這樣的東西。為了找到答案，他一直在進行模擬實驗。