Victoria Samson
16.7K posts
@VSamson_DC
Hates the humidity, loves cats. Works on space policy for @SWFoundation, but opinions are mine, not the organization's. She/her
🚀 2026 Global Counterspace Capabilities Report — Now Available SWF is proud to release the 9th version of its Global Counterspace Capabilities: An Open Source Assessment report, edited by @VSamson_DC and Kathleen Brett, with support from Emily Kunasek. A thread on key updates 🧵
Not a good story. Over the past year, China continues to abandon numerous upper stages in long-lived low earth orbit,* counter to best practices for the long term sustainment of space. I initially sounded the alarm on this issue in April 2025, and further highlighted the issue in an August 2025 article and...the update is that things only continue to get worse. For those not familiar, the total orbital debris mass is a key variable for the long term sustainment of space. There is broad agreement that abandoning rocket body upper stages in long-lived orbits is NOT a best practice. In fact, all the major space-faring nations have acknowledged this (e.g., IADC signatories). However, as China's "mega constellations" launch rate increases, so does the number of abandoned rocket bodies in long-lived high LEO orbits. Russia and the US dominate the number of rocket bodies remaining in such long-lived orbits, rooted in historical practices from decades ago with minimal orbital debris concerns (graphic, bottom panel). HOWEVER, China's upper stages are estimated to have much higher masses on average. Although the US has almost double such objects, China's total mass of such objects is 252 metric tons and increasingly rapidly vs the US total of 57 metric tons (and holding steady). It's acknowledged there are some uncertainties in PRC upper stage dry mass values (Graphic, top panel). No matter, things are not going well. * "Long-lived LEO" is defined here as having a min perigee height of 600 km and an orbit height less than 2000 km (to preclude HEO rocket bodies) ** Object mass estimate use @planet4589 's dry mass from the GCAT *** Orbit data from U.S. Space Forces – Space (S4S) via space-track.org, used with permission per ODR 24-002-4.
this is a little reminder that rescuers have jobs, lives, health issues, depression, anxiety, etc just like you and I'm running a rescue on top of that, 24/7. I barely have time to breathe. please don't be a dick 🥰 anyway here are some cats
Nothing “quiet” about it. We are proud to reverse the DOJ’s weaponization under the Biden administration. We will do everything in our power to make whole those who were persecuted for political purposes. This includes stripping DOJ’s website of partisan propaganda.
An alien who is in the U.S. temporarily and wants a Green Card must return to their home country to apply. This policy allows our immigration system to function as the law intended instead of incentivizing loopholes. The era of abusing our nation’s immigration system is over.
🚀 TODAY | 1–2 PM ET SWF + CSISAerospace Counterspace Report Release Feat. @VSamson_DC, Kathleen Brett, Kari Bingen, and @crswope. 📡 Join the discussion + Q&A 👉 csis.org/events/what-ar…
