{"id":47895,"date":"2025-07-30T16:08:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T16:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/47895\/"},"modified":"2025-07-30T16:08:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T16:08:09","slug":"us-earth-imaging-satellite-fleet-is-creating-low-cost-orbital-landmines-china-team-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/47895\/","title":{"rendered":"US Earth imaging satellite fleet is creating \u2018low-cost orbital landmines\u2019, China team says"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">A team of Chinese researchers has criticised the world\u2019s largest Earth-imaging satellite fleet, describing the shoebox-sized spacecraft as \u201clow-cost orbital landmines\u201d that threaten the safety of space operations.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Using a self-developed tracking platform, software scientists at the Chinese Academy of Sciences analysed the Dove constellation \u2013 which has launched hundreds of CubeSats since 2013 to provide daily, medium-resolution imagery of the Earth\u2019s surface \u2013 according to the team\u2019s article posted on Chinese social media on July 21.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The Chinese team said the thruster-less satellites operated by San Francisco-based Planet Labs, posed a growing threat to space safety.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">They found that by early July more than 80 per cent of the 662 Dove satellites had deorbited, raising concerns about uncontrolled re-entry and potential collisions. They also noted that more than 100 Doves listed in public databases, including the US Space Force\u2019s tracking website, were assigned \u201cincorrect or fabricated\u201d identification codes and lacked orbital data.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1o401188 css-1w1l3op e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/clean.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p data-qa=\"SCMPYoutubeVideoPreview-PreviewDuration\" class=\"css-1vqvq42 e1o401181\">01:19<\/p>\n<p data-qa=\"SCMPYoutubeVideoPreview-PreviewTitle\" class=\"css-zasw6y e1o401182\">SpaceX Starship explodes during routine pre-launch ground test<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX Starship explodes during routine pre-launch ground test<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cThe Dove constellation has reshaped the commercial Earth observation industry with its low-cost, high-frequency observation model,\u201d the researchers wrote. \u201cHowever, it may be turning valuable low Earth orbits into a dangerous \u2018minefield\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A team of Chinese researchers has criticised the world\u2019s largest Earth-imaging satellite fleet, describing the shoebox-sized spacecraft as&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47896,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[6122,37467,37470,37465,24170,37471,3631,37469,37468,37466,5284,79,193,7575],"class_list":["post-47895","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-chinese-academy-of-sciences","tag-cubesats","tag-dove-constellation","tag-dove-satellites","tag-earth-observation","tag-earth-imaging-satellites","tag-international-space-station","tag-jonathan-mcdowell","tag-low-earth-orbit","tag-planet-labs","tag-san-francisco","tag-science","tag-space","tag-us-space-force"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47895\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}