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Amazon is launching its Kuiper satellites aboard an Atlas V rocket<\/p>\n
United Launch Alliance<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n
Amazon is set to launch its first ever satellites on 6 October, as the company kicks off plans for a space internet service known as Project Kuiper that it hopes will rival SpaceX\u2019s Starlink.<\/p>\n
A pair of satellites called KuiperSat-1 and KuiperSat-2 are scheduled to launch on a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral in Florida at 7pm BST on 6 October. They are due to be placed in an orbit 500 kilometres above Earth\u2019s surface, to test out key components of the Kuiper mega constellation, which is planned to consist of 3200 satellites.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really important to test the satellites before they can launch the rest of the constellation,\u201d says Tim Farrar, a satellite communications consultant in the UK. \u201cThis is a big step forward that we\u2019ve been waiting a long time for.\u201d<\/p>\n
Project Kuiper satellites are designed to connect to remote terminals on Earth, providing internet access in remote or secluded locations that otherwise lack connectivity.<\/p>\n
Such space internet has been the target of several companies in recent years, most notably SpaceX in the US and Eutelsat\u2019s OneWeb in the UK. The former has already launched about 5000 satellites and boasts some 2 million users, while OneWeb has nearly 650 satellites in orbit. Amazon is playing catch-up, says Farrar. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be very challenging because they are four or five years behind SpaceX at least,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Amazon has committed to spending $10 billion on Kuiper. Last year, it essentially bought up all the spare launch capacity in the world on every available non-SpaceX rocket \u2013 seemingly in an attempt to avoid giving money to its major competitor.<\/p>\n However, the development of many of the rockets Amazon intends to use, such as ULA\u2019s Vulcan Centaur, has been delayed. That sparked ire from some of Amazon\u2019s shareholders, who filed a lawsuit in August alleging a personal rivalry between Amazon boss Jeff Bezos and SpaceX\u2019s Elon Musk had seen Amazon overlook SpaceX\u2019s Falcon rockets. Amazon dismissed the claims as \u201ccompletely without merit\u201d.<\/p>\n The delay has seen the company turn to the Atlas V rocket to launch its two prototype satellites, despite the rocket being much larger than required. While not much is known about each KuiperSat, they are estimated to each be more than 500 kilograms in mass, which is too large for most small rockets in operation today, but undersized compared with the Atlas V\u2019s massive lifting capacity of 7000 kilograms \u2013 a bit like sending small items in large cardboard boxes, as Amazon\u2019s retail arm occasionally does.<\/p>\n \u201cThere isn\u2019t really much on the table that\u2019s at an intermediate rocket level,\u201d says Jonathan McDowell at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Massachusetts. \u201cAmazon really want to get these up now.\u201d<\/p>\n Amazon says it will begin production of its full Kuiper satellites later this year and start launching them in the first half of next year, with an early Kuiper service due to roll out in the second half of 2024. Eventually, it plans to offer internet speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second, comparable to fibre-optic broadband.<\/p>\n For this launch, each prototype satellite will carry instruments to test how users on the ground might connect to Kuiper. One satellite will also test out a method to reduce the brightness of the satellite in the night sky, in order to prevent the future Kuiper mega constellation from being a hazard to astronomers, but Amazon hasn\u2019t revealed exactly how this will work.<\/p>\n Chris Johnson, space law adviser at the Secure World Foundation in the US, says there are still issues to resolve regarding both the impact of mega constellations on astronomy and managing such large numbers of satellites in orbit to avoid collisions. \u201cGlobal constellations are here now and the train has left the station,\u201d he says. \u201cBut that doesn\u2019t mean the game is up. These things can still be regulated.\u201d<\/p>\n Topics:<\/p>\n<\/section><\/div>\n