HONG KONG -- On Aug. 6, a Long March-6 rocket emblazoned with the Chinese flag roared off the launch pad of the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, spewing fire and plumes of smoke. Its powerful engines hoisted 18 communications satellites into low Earth orbit, or LEO.
That cosmic neighborhood below an altitude of 2,000 kilometers is currently dominated by Starlink, the internet service of Elon Musk's SpaceX, which accounts for the vast majority of satellites circling our planet.
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