RobotRisk Autonomous Systems Incident & Risk Register
RobotRisk / Starfish Space / 2023-06-12
defense space · mission-loss

Spinning spacecraft adds unwelcome twist to Starfish Space's docking test mission

S4 · 06/12
2023 · Starfish Space

Record

CompanyStarfish Space
Categorydefense space
Typemission-loss
Date06/12
2023
Time of daynot documented
Locationno physical site (recall / fleet-wide / aggregate record)
SeverityS4 (serious injury, total loss, or grounding)
Scale1 spacecraft (Otter Pup / LEO Pathfinder)
Confidencemedium
VerificationYes - adversarially checked against the cited source
SourceGeekWire

What happened

Starfish Space's Otter Pup demonstration spacecraft (LEO Pathfinder mission) began uncontrollably spinning shortly after deployment, consuming propellant and forcing the company to abandon its planned autonomous docking demonstration.

Starfish Space record context

Starfish Space vs defense space alternatives

defense space context

defense space: entries by year

362019 S3: 11192020 S3: 11202021 S3: 12021 S4: 12212022 S2: 12022 S3: 12222023 S4: 11232024 S4: 11242025 S2: 12025 S3: 12025 S4: 46252026 S4: 6626
S1S2S3S4S5

defense space: failure modes

defense space: most entries

mission-loss context

mission-loss: by category

mission-loss: by year

mission-loss: severity profile

Comparable mission-loss events in defense space

SevDateCompanyEvent
S42026-08-19Katalyst Space TechnologiesNASA and Katalyst end Swift Observatory rescue mission after spacecraft failure
S42026-08-13General Atomics Aeronautical SystemsUS lost roughly 25% of MQ-9 Reaper drone fleet during Iran war
S42026-08-03TekeverTekever AR3 StormShroud UAV shot down and recovered by Russian forces
S42025-12-22JAXAJapanese H3 rocket fails during launch of navigation satellite
S4Space Machines CompanyOptimus-1 orbital servicing satellite lost after communications failure

Other Starfish Space entries

Also from Critical Systems Analysis: CSA - functional safety engineering · Company directory · FSTalent - functional safety jobs