SpaceX Attributes Jul. 24 Starlink Outage to Network Upgrade – PC Magazine

(Starbase, Texas) SpaceX attributed this past Thursday’s (Jul. 24) rare, widespread Starlink outage to a network upgrade, which temporarily shut down access to the satellite internet system, after a SpaceX executive previously said the disruption was due to a “failure of key internal software services,” according to PC Magazine.

Photo illustration by Jonathan Raa/NurPhoto via Getty Images courtesy of courtesy of PC Magazine.

Per PC Magazine, SpaceX sent a message to resellers of Starlink services which shed more light on what triggered the disruption, specifically attributing the error to an “upgrade procedure” that involved rolling out software to Starlink’s “ground-based compute clusters,” according to an industry source.

The message sent to resellers explains that a rare mix of factors during the upgrade caused a disruption in Starlink’s core network by overloading the system while traffic was being distributed across the computing infrastructure, according to PC Magazine.

Starlink works by using orbiting satellites to relay data from ground-based antennas and facilities on Earth connected to fiber networks.

Starlink network diagram courtesy of Starllink.com via PC Magazine.

Last week’s outage occurred around 3pm ET (19.00 GMT), when Starlink services about six million customers across the globe; subscribers across North America and other parts of the world were briefly forced offline as a result, according to PC Magazine.

SpaceX was able to restore access for most users in about 2.5 hours. The outage was the longest in Starlink’s history, according to PC Magazine.

PC Magazine also reported that since the time of the outage, several Starlink users have reported experiencing faster speeds, raising speculation that the outage was related to a network upgrade.

SpaceX executive Michael Nicolls previously apologized for the outage, according to PC Magazine, saying: “We are deeply committed to providing a highly reliable network, and will fully root cause this issue and ensure it does not occur again.”