Earlier today, the first two Starlink demo satellites, called Tintin A & B, were deployed, and they are successfully communicating to Earth stations. Elon Musk, SpaceX CEO, announced this via his official Twitter profile. Before that, SpaceX tweeted: “Successful deployment of PAZ satellite to low-Earth orbit confirmed,” along with an image of the satellite.
Starlink could one day beam high-speed internet worldwide, Newsweek reported. The plan was announced in 2014 by Musk himself. At the time, Musk’s company SpaceX, was still in the early stages of developing advanced micro-stateliest.
Starlink is, in Musk’s words, supposed to “serve the last served,” and the name was inspired by a John Green novel. The first 800 satellites could, according to analysis, provide worldwide broadband coverage. Since Musk plans to deploy thousands of satellites in the future, it’s safe to infer that Starlink will indeed increase bandwidth availability, as well as capacity.
Less then an hour ago, Elon Musk made another interesting announcement on Twitter. Apparently, the first two demo Starlink satellites, Tintin A & B, will say hello to the world, quite literally. The satellites will beam the words “hello world” when they pass Los Angeles, which should be, according to Musk, in about twenty two hours.
Apart from announcing this, the SpaceX CEO joked that the WiFi password is “martians,” then later adding “That was a DM, right?”
First two Starlink demo satellites, called Tintin A & B, deployed and communicating to Earth stations pic.twitter.com/TfI53wHEtz
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2018
Tintin A & B will attempt to beam “hello world” in about 22 hours when they pass near LA
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2018
Don’t tell anyone, but the wifi password is “martians”
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2018
Social media is buzzing with comments about the launch, and Musk’s tweets have already been retweeted and favorited thousands of times. This constellation of satellites is expected to “beam internet” down to Earth. The South African billionaire and innovator’s satellite internet plan was backed by the Federal Communications Commission, as well as the organization’s chairman, Ajit Pai.
This was reported on February 14 by CNBC . Mr. Pai said in a statement that he hopes this could help Americans in rural areas have better internet, since cell towers and fiber optic cables do not reach them. Pai, who has been criticized as head of the organization that repealed net neutrality, made headlines after supporting Musk’s endeavors.
Yesterday, Donald Trump’s Vice President Mike Pence announced candidates for the newly reinstated National Space Council, Space.com reported. Apart from that, Pence praised the successful launch of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy, criticizing government agencies who have, in his words, “remained stuck in the past.”
According to Inverse , Pence made it clear that the National Space Council will, under his leadership, prioritize setting up private aerospace industries to succeed, instead of relying on agencies like NASA.
