[thecrumb]

Not too worried about it. They have a shelf life and I imagine their design will improve over time.

I'd rather see some regulations against all the lights in the Walmart/shopping mall/grocery store parking lots which have completely ruined the night sky in my area.

[batbomb]

The shelf life isn't the problem. The problem is quantity in the sky (this will continuously be relaunched) and how bright they are. This will ruin many long exposures for many existing telescopes, but you can do some amount of image subtraction if you do many short exposures. That's might be a problem for some instruments depending on their readout electronics.

It's also a global problem.

[aeternus]

The video in the article is not representative. Solar sails were not in the final position and the satellites were not in their final (higher) orbit. It was also taken during the short time-window that the sun was still illuminating the satellites.

Regardless, we should be moving our telescopes to space. Much less interference of all kinds.

[batbomb]

The amount of light will still be appreciable and will affect many kinds of observatories around the world, even at magnitudes less brightness.

You also can't slew a telescope in space like you can on ground, it would be extremely cost prohibitive in terms of fuel.

"moving telescopes to space" is the equivalent of "let them eat cake" comment in this funding environment. It sounds like a wonderful proposition until you realize how many observatories we have on the ground and their utilization and how expensive it would be to replicate half that utilization. It's already not easy getting time on a telescope, if everybody had to be crammed on 15 space observatories costing $1B/each, there would be no observational time for grad students or post docs let alone funding for research. You also kill follow up observations on temporal events.

Of course, maybe the government could reach an agreement with SpaceX to send up the observatories for free and send some money the way of the astronomers for seriously messing up the sky, but there's no reason to expect SpaceX to be a good citizen of the night sky.

[aeternus]

>there's no reason to expect SpaceX to be a good citizen of the night sky.

Seems like they are willing to do more than most:

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1132908915144794113

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1132908689860415488

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1132902372458418176

[perilunar]

>You also can't slew a telescope in space like you can on ground, it would be extremely cost prohibitive in terms of fuel.

You can use reaction wheels instead for zero fuel use.

[batbomb]

not quickly

[vbuwivbiu]

after their shelf life SpaceX will send more up. That's our night sky ruined as long as SpaceX exists and any competitors.

[Robotbeat]

That's not accurate unless you think the current satellites (many of which are far brighter, such as ISS and Iridium flares) already "ruin" the night sky.

I watched a recent pass of the Starlink satellites, and now that they're oriented near their operational directions, I could barely see them. I only noticed them because I knew right where to look. Unlike the flashing lights of passing aircraft which were a lot more distracting.

[jjeaff]

Iridium has about 85 satellites in service.

SpaceX satellites are much closer and they are planning something around 7,500 of them.

Might not be too hard to look in just the right place with that many floating around.

[Robotbeat]

SpaceX will also be serving orders of magnitude more customers than Iridium. Being closer also means they'll pass in the Earth's shadow earlier in the night than Iridium.

[jasonhansel]

These SpaceX satellites were reported as UFOs, so they were clearly quite visible to people not looking for them.

[Robotbeat]

They were much brighter and closer together right after deployment than in operation. Already, they've spread out and are now aligned in operational configuration so they're far less noticeable than at first. On par with typical satellites. I spotted them night before last, and it was difficult to see them.

ISS is also sometimes reported as a UFO. It's often brighter than Venus.