Ukraine’s government announces that SpaceX’s Starlink has around 150,000 users in its country currently. Vice prime minister Mykhailo Fedorov said, “Ukraine will stay connected no matter what.” Elon Musk’s Starlink has been showing ample support to the Ukrainian citizens. More deliveries are expected in the coming months as the invasion continues.
Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice prime minister, tweeted that Starlink, a subsidiary of SpaceX, was providing “crucial support” for the country’s infrastructure and “restoring the destroyed territories.”
Rough data on Starlink's usage: around 150K active users per day. This is crucial support for Ukraine's infrastructure and restoring the destroyed territories. Ukraine will stay connected no matter what. pic.twitter.com/XWjyxPQJyX
— Mykhailo Fedorov (@FedorovMykhailo) May 2, 2022
Musk said on March 27 that Starlink had been activated in Ukraine. At the time, Ukrainian government officials were calling for the delivery of more Starlink stations amid concerns that Russia’s invasion could disrupt Ukraine’s internet services. Ukraine’s digital transformation ministry, which is headed by Fedorov, didn’t respond to Insider’s request for comment. NBC News reported Friday that Starlink had about 10,000 terminals, the dishes that connect users to Starlink satellites, up and running in Ukraine.
Fedorov told The Washington Post in late March that his country was using “thousands” of Starlink terminals. Although he didn’t disclose the exact number of active Starlink terminals in Ukraine, a person with knowledge of the matter told The Post that there were more than 5,000 in the country – suggesting that the number of Starlink terminals in service in Ukraine doubled in five weeks. SpaceX didn’t immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment about how many Starlink users and terminals are currently active in Ukraine.
Sending shipments
In late February, Fedorov reached out to Musk on Twitter to ask the billionaire to send Starlink terminals to Ukraine. The next day, Musk said Starlink had been activated in the country. The company then continued to send shipments of Starlink terminals to Ukraine, according to tweets by Fedorov.
@elonmusk, while you try to colonize Mars — Russia try to occupy Ukraine! While your rockets successfully land from space — Russian rockets attack Ukrainian civil people! We ask you to provide Ukraine with Starlink stations and to address sane Russians to stand.
— Mykhailo Fedorov (@FedorovMykhailo) February 26, 2022
“This is not an ideal internet,” said Dmytro Zinchuk, the head of network operations for the internet provider Freenet, which mostly serves the area around Kyiv and western and northern Ukraine. “But still when there is no connection at all, Starlink is just a salvation for people who have been without connection for many weeks.”
He said his company has so far integrated five government-donated Starlink terminals in its mad dash to get as many customers back online as possible in areas that faced heavy Russian bombardment. That can mean wiring hundreds of people to a terminal meant for a single household. “We are well aware that Starlink is not really created for this, but we managed to launch 150+ subscribers on one Starlink,” Zinchuk said in an interview on the messaging app Telegram.
