SpaceX has published details of orbital near-misses involving its Starlink constellation and is calling on other satellite operators to share ephemeris data — the positional and velocity parameters that allow collision avoidance. The company says that in 2026 it encountered about 650 unique maneuvering third-party satellites, but only around half of them shared ephemeris. It also observed roughly 164,000 conjunctions where the time of closest approach fell within four hours of an unannounced manoeuvre, warning that such gaps in information can create preventable collision risk.
SpaceX attributes the lack of sharing to concerns about proprietary information and, in some cases, government restrictions on data release. It points to its own avoidance successes, including an October 2025 event where a predicted miss distance dropped from 9 km to 57 metres after the other satellite manoeuvred unexpectedly, and an August 2026 pass that ended with the two vehicles 134 metres apart after a Starlink satellite "ducked" to present a narrower profile.
The Register notes the irony of SpaceX asking for better coordination while seeking permission to operate 100,000 Starlink satellites and up to 1 million Starmind AI satellites. Neuraspace CEO Chiara Manfletti agrees the problem is real and that SpaceX's space-safety platform is welcome, but argues the long-term solution must be a federated, interoperable space-traffic ecosystem rather than reliance on one company's system. She says Neuraspace has reached out to SpaceX to enable cross-platform coordination, and that taking that step would be a strong sign of leadership. The Register also observes that orbital debris — unlike aircraft wreckage — lingers for months or years, and that SpaceX's air-travel analogy omits the thousands of spent rocket bodies and paint flakes already in orbit.