Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #smallsat
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Are you ready to make history together? ✈️🚀💫 Join us as we launch our #StartMeUp mission today, the FIRST launch from the UK! Follow this thread for all launch day updates 🧵
Lucky launch socks = CHECK. ✅ Popcorn = CHECK. ✅ Tune into the livestream with us here, starting at 1:15pm PT/9:15pm GMT: virg.in/J8hC 
What’s on board? Our #LauncherOne is carrying nine payloads to orbit in partnership with the United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) and the United States’ National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).
To date, more than 5800 launches have resulted in over 44,000 tracked objects in orbit, of which more than 20,000 remain in space and are regularly tracked by surveillance networks around the globe
#SpaceDebris🛰️
#SpaceDebris🛰️
~26% of catalogued objects are satellites, and only a small fraction of those - about 2000 - are still operating today
~17% of tracked objects are used upper stages of rockets and mission-related objects like launch adapters and lens covers
A drifting thermal blanket,📸1998
~17% of tracked objects are used upper stages of rockets and mission-related objects like launch adapters and lens covers
A drifting thermal blanket,📸1998
More than half of the #spacedebris population was generated by 500+ in-space break-ups. The two major fragmentation events are clearly visible as jumps in the graph:
2007: Chinese anti-satellite missile test
2009: Collision between Iridium 33 and Kosmos-2251 satellites
2007: Chinese anti-satellite missile test
2009: Collision between Iridium 33 and Kosmos-2251 satellites
