Taps Coogan – May 8th, 2023
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As SpaceX and NASA continue to test the SLS and Spaceship rockets aimed at restarting human exploration of Space, a different but equally important space race is playing out in Earth orbit: the race to build out the satellites infrastructure to enable a burgeoning list of commercial, scientific, and military applications. Via Statista:
The United States is leading that race with an order of magnitude more satellites in orbit than any other nation. That is mostly due to SpaceX’s Starlink communication constellation which accounts for over 2,200 of the US satellites highlighted above but even without those satellites, the US would hold a comfortable lead of the runner up, China.
Notably absent from the list of top countries is the Europe. However, if all the satellites from EU member countries are added up, they would total slightly higher than 300, putting the block behind the UK but ahead of Russia. The raw data can be viewed here.
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