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(meteorobs) Impacts
Lew Gramer wrote:
> Thanks for your contribution, Dr. Foschini! Your characterization of the
> physical threat to artificial satellites from meteoroid impacts agrees closely
> with that on the NASA (Jenniskens) Leonids site at:
> http://www-space.arc.nasadot gov/~leonid/hazard.html
> Thanks also for the review reference!
Thank you for your interest.
> I'm not saying impacts CAN'T happen: just that they seem mighty unlikely!
Yes, impact probabilities are low, expecially for common satellites.
Moreover, impacts generally do not hit vital parts, as known from
post-flight analyses on several satellites (e.g. Hubble Space
Telescope).
The main threat is now the plasma production, also taking into account
that, in order to make cheaper satellites, commercial electronics is now
used.
Cheers,
Luigi Foschini
References: