US government issues first-ever space debris penalty to Dish Network::Dish to pay $150,000 for failing to properly dispose of satellite and violating the FCC’s anti-space debris rule
US government issues first-ever space debris penalty to Dish Network::Dish to pay $150,000 for failing to properly dispose of satellite and violating the FCC’s anti-space debris rule
Nice in concept.
In practice this is useless- a $150k fine when removing the satellite will someday cost millions.
It’s also worth noting that de-orbiting was never the plan here. Geosynchronous satellites are too far up to make that practical- at 22,000 mi altitude, the amount of delta-v necessary for a deorbit is gigantic. So instead the satellite ‘boosts’ up to a ‘graveyard’ orbit about 300km above the geosynchronous ring.
Dish only boosted it 122km above the geosynchronous ring. Thus the fine. In practice this satellite will probably cause nobody any problems.