The delay was only 4 seconds. This time. But with 30,000 trackable objects in orbit and more every day, this is going to become commonplace and the delays are going to be worse.
“30000 trackable objects in orbit” is nothing. Somebody doesn’t quite understand the scale.
Why is it “going to get worse”? A 4-second delay might need to be done for launches more frequently, but I don’t see why the delays would get longer than that - debris moves out of the way at the same speed regardless of how much of it there is. This doesn’t seem like a big deal. If a 4-second delay risks killing your mission then you probably should have designed the mission with more leeway in its launch window to begin with. There are a huge number of technical issues that could easily cause a 4-second delay.
Of course, that doesn’t result in a headline that draws clicks.
Edit: I just read the article. “It’s going to get worse” doesn’t appear anywhere in it. You just made that up.
I understand the sentiment but a 4 second delay is hardly a story.
It’s four seconds this time. With more and more debris building up over time, this problem is only going to get worse.
A 4 second delay can mean losing a launch window.
Maybe if you’re trying to hit a Honda Civic from a couple million miles away using an unpowered ballistic trajectory.
4 seconds? Usually launch windows are in hours and days right? Unless you have barely any fuel margin and you’re trying to hit a very very specific orbit I can’t imagine 4 seconds being a huge issue. But I’m no orbital dynamicist
It’s not a huge deal, and if it were then the mission is already balanced on a knife’s edge and shouldn’t have been designed that way in the first place. There are plenty of technical problems that could cause a 4-second delay.
