[hnbad]

From the same article:

> However, even a catastrophic Kessler scenario at LEO would pose minimal risk for launches continuing past LEO, or satellites travelling at medium Earth orbit (MEO) or geosynchronous orbit (GEO). The catastrophic scenarios predict an increase in the number of collisions per year, as opposed to a physically impassable barrier to space exploration that occurs in higher orbits.

There's also a statement by SpaceX about why Starlink won't cause this but that's not worth the paper it's printed on given that SpaceX would of course say that.

It does sound like the Kessler syndrome risk is higher for heavier, higher orbit satellites so a more likely issue would be a higher orbit satellite starting a debris cascade that could take out Starlink (and cause Kessler syndrome) rather than Starlink satellites going haywire and causing the cascade themselves.

[JumpCrisscross]

> sound like the Kessler syndrome risk is higher for heavier, higher orbit satellites

A Kessler scenario, not syndrome. Localised to a set of orbits within which you see a rise of collisions. The number of affected orbits doesn’t increase for more than a few months, at which point the problem is constrained within space.