SpaceX confirmed on Tuesday that it lost 40 out of 49 Starlink satellites launched via a Falcon 9 rocket, losing their orbit thanks to a geomagnetic storm.

The company explained that almost all of the lost satellites have either already re-entered or will soon re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere where they will eventually burn up before reaching the ground.

The satellites into lower orbit approximately 210 kilometers above Earth for the initial system checkout before moving them to a higher orbit through a controlled flight.

"The geomagnetic storms cause the atmosphere to warm and atmospheric density at our low deployment altitudes to increase," SpaceX explained in an update. "In fact, onboard GPS suggests the escalation speed and severity of the storm caused atmospheric drag to increase up to 50% higher than during previous launches."

In response to the storm, the Starlink team commanded the satellites into a safe mode to "take cover from the storm" so the satellites would "fly edge-on like a sheet of paper to minimize drag", the company said.

However, according to the company: "preliminary analysis show the increased drag at the low altitudes prevented the satellites from leaving safe-mode to begin orbit raising manoeuvres, and up to 40 of the satellites will re-enter or already have re-entered the Earth's atmosphere."

SpaceX’s Starlink is a satellite network designed to provide broadband internet access covering most of Earth. The satellites are meant to carry large amounts of information rapidly to any point on Earth, even over the oceans and in extremely hard-to-reach places where fiber-optic cables would be expensive to lay down.

In January, CEO Elon Musk acclaimed that 1,469 Starlink satellites were currently active in low orbit.

Astronomers often voiced concerns about huge constellations of satellites in low orbit interfering with their research, particularly affecting space observations.

Beijing has even lodged a complaint about SpaceX with the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs in December 2021. They claimed that its astronauts had to conduct evasive maneuvers to avoid Starlink satellites on two separate occasions as they were on board the China Space Station.
-RT