Starlink satellites with solar arrays deployed. | Image: SpaceX
A collision in space was narrowly avoided last week when a newly deployed Chinese satellite came within a few hundred meters of one of the roughly 9,000 Starlink satellites currently operating in low Earth orbit. SpaceX is laying the blame on the satellite operator for not sharing location data.
"When satellite operators do not share ephemeris for their satellites, dangerously close approaches can occur in space," wrote Michael Nicolls, VP of Starlink Engineering. "A few days ago, 9 satellites were deployed from a launch from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Northwestern China. As far as we know, no coordination or deconfliction with …