If there are many satellites orbiting earth, how do space launches not bump into any of them?
In: 2066
Imagine there were 10,000 people standing on the Earth, spaced more or less evenly apart. There would be hundreds of miles between each person, standing in what is essentially a 1’x1′ square. Now drop a telephone pole from Space, and what are your chances of it hitting one of those people?
Chances are very low, because the people are so small, and the space between them is so very large.
There are fewer than 10,000 satellites in orbit, and the “sphere” of their orbits is much larger than the surface of the Earth, so the chance of a rocket launch hitting one of those satellites is even lower than the chances of our pretend telephone pole hitting a person standing on Earth.
Another factor is the altitude at which satellites orbit. There are many satellites that orbit at VERY high altitudes around the Earth, above the paths of many rocket launches. For instance, the ISS is only 400 km up, where many satellites will be orbiting 1,000-10,000 km above the Earth’s surface.
Also, all the satellites in orbit are tracked and their position at a certain time is very predictable.
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