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Comment by konmok

1 day ago

Those are rocks, which are not made from the same stuff as satellites. (Also, the article says it's 44 tons, and other sources suggest around 50 at most.) In any case, I don't think anyone here is "freaking out", I just think this issue merits investigation.

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  • In the same sense that you do.

    • No, in a much more direct sense. By the time a Starlink sat re-enters its fuel is gone so it’s mostly a pile of silicon, solar panels, lithium batteries, aluminum, etc.

      The circuit boards are probably the goofiest chemical compositions but they represent a drop in the bucket mass-wise for the sats and pale in comparison to how many circuit boards get blown up every day in Iran/Ukraine/Russia.

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