Starshield restrictions tightened for three days in a row: what SpaceX says

The American company SpaceX has denied imposing speed restrictions on Starshield, the military version of the Starlink satellite communications system used by Ukraine. At the same time, the Ukrainian side claims that the outages lasted for three consecutive days and led to the disruption of military missions.

This is reported by Axios, citing a Ukrainian official.

According to the publication’s interlocutor, the restrictions were getting worse every day. At first, they affected 10% of missions, but the next day this figure increased to 50%. By the third day, all missions could not be completed due to the restrictions.

However, SpaceX denied any changes to the system’s operation.

“This is not true. There have been no changes,” the company said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced another slowdown in Starshield operations the day before. According to him, the Ukrainian military checked the circumstances of the incident and concluded that it was not a random technical failure, but a systemic speed limit. This is the second such incident in a month.

At the same time, as the Financial Times writes , senior Ukrainian officials suggest that the restrictions may have been introduced intentionally to increase pressure on Kyiv during peace talks. One official noted that Washington’s actions appear to be helping to strengthen Russia’s position.

Recall, Zelensky previously reported on problems with Starlink and the consequences of speed limits for Ukrainian drones . According to him, the connection was turned off at speeds above 161 kilometers per hour, which prevented the Shahed jets from intercepting them.