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The private rocket company founded by Elon Musk launched one of its reusable rockets from Cape Canaveral on Monday, to beam internet services around the world. But astronomers worry about the light pollution it is causing

SpaceX launches 60 additional Starlink satellites for global internet

A photo provided by SpaceX shows a view of SpaceX’s Starlink’s satellites just before being deployed on May 24, 2019. Various companies are pressing ahead with plans for internet service from space, which has prompted astronomers to voice concerns about the impact on research from telescopes on EarthImage: SpaceX via The New York TimesOn Monday morning, SpaceX launched one of  its reusable rockets from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying 60  satellites into space at once. It was the second payload of Starlink,  its planned constellation of tens of thousands of orbiting transmitters  to beam internet service across the globe.When SpaceX, the private rocket company founded by Elon Musk,  launched the first batch of Starlink orbiters in May, many astronomers  were surprised to see that the satellites were extremely bright, causing  them to fear that the constellation would wreak havoc on scientific  research and transform our view of the stars. Since then, many  scientists have been on a mission to better quantify the impacts of  Starlink and to share their concerns with SpaceX.In response, SpaceX has said that it wants to mitigate the potential  impacts of Starlink. But at the same time, the company is still moving  full steam ahead.In October, Musk announced that he was using Twitter via a Starlink  internet connection, as his company was requesting permission from the  Federal Communications Commission to operate as many as 30,000  satellites on top of the 12,000 already approved. Should SpaceX succeed  in sending this many satellites to low Earth orbit, its constellation  would contain more than eight times as many satellites as the total  number currently in orbit.That move added to the worries of many astronomers.When James Lowenthal, an astronomer at Smith College, first saw the  train of Starlink satellites marching like false stars across the night  sky in the spring, he knew something had shifted.“I felt as if life as an astronomer and a lover of the night sky would never be the same,” he said.Most of the first Starlink nodes have since moved to higher orbits  and are now invisible for most of us who live under bright city lights.  But they are still noticeable from places with dark skies. If thousands  more of these satellites are launched, Lowenthal said he feared “it will  look as if the whole sky is crawling with stars.”Since May, the American Astronomical Society has convened an ad hoc  committee with Lowenthal and other experts to discuss their concerns  with SpaceX representatives once a month.At the same time, SpaceX has been working directly with the National  Radio Astronomy Observatory, a federally funded research center that  operates facilities across the world, to jointly minimize potential  impacts of Starlink satellites on radio wavelengths that astronomers  use.But these conversations did not focus on light pollution, a problem  presented by the reflective surfaces of proposed satellite  constellations such as Starlink. At first, SpaceX said the complication  would be minimal, and the new committee is trying to assess the impact  and actively find solutions.“So far, they’ve been quite open and generous with their data,” Lowenthal said. “But they have not made any promises.”A spokeswoman from SpaceX said the company was taking steps to paint  the Earth-facing bases of the satellites black to reduce their  reflectiveness. But Anthony Tyson, an astronomer at the University of  California, Davis, said that would not solve the problem.Tyson is the chief scientist for the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope —  a 27-foot, billion-dollar telescope under construction in Chile that  will scan the entire sky every three days. The survey, the world’s  largest yet, will help astronomers better understand dark energy, dark  matter, the origin of the Milky Way and the outer regions of the solar  system. But because it is designed to scan faint objects, it is expected  to be greatly affected by the satellites.Tyson’s simulations showed that the telescope would pick up  Starlink-like objects even if they were darkened. And they wouldn’t just  affect a single pixel in a photograph. When there is a single bright  object in the image, it can create fainter artifacts as well because of  internal reflections within the telescope’s detector. Moreover, whenever  a satellite photobombs a long-exposure image, it causes a bright streak  of light that can cross directly in front of an object astronomers wish  to observe.“It’s really a mess,” Tyson said.Knowing how challenging it would be to  correct these interrupted images, Tyson decided the best step forward  was to set the telescope to avoid Starlink satellites. While simulations  based on the earlier 12,000-satellite total suggested that would be  possible, SpaceX’s application for 30,000 additional satellites upset  the calculations.“We’re redoing the models now just to see what’s visible at any one  time — and it’s really quite frightening,” said Patrick Seitzer, a  professor of astronomy emeritus at the University of Michigan, who has  been running similar analyses to determine how many satellites will be  visible and when.His preliminary results suggest that avoiding the satellites would be  difficult during twilight — a serious problem given that potentially  hazardous asteroids and many objects in the solar system are best seen  during this time. The satellites thus limit the ability of astronomers  to observe them.And Tyson’s early simulations also confirm the potential problems,  demonstrating that over the course of a full year, the giant telescope  would not be able to dodge these satellites 20% of the time. Instead,  those images would be effectively ruined.SpaceX’s 30,000 satellites might also  just be the start as other companies, such as Amazon, Telesat and  OneWeb, plan to launch similar mega-constellations.“If there are lots and lots of bright moving objects in the sky, it  tremendously complicates our job,” Lowenthal said. “It potentially  threatens the science of astronomy itself.”Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who closely tracks objects in orbit, agrees.“There is a point at which it makes ground-based astronomy impossible  to do,” he said. “I’m not saying Starlink is that point. But if you  just don’t worry about it and go another 10 years with more and more  mega-constellations, eventually you are going to come to a point where  you can’t do astronomy anymore. And so let’s talk about it now.”While astronomers are starting those conversations, they have little  legal recourse. There are no regulations in place to protect the skies  against light pollution.“International space law is pretty wide  open,” said Megan Donahue, an astronomer at Michigan State University  and president of the American Astronomical Society. While many  astronomers have been concerned about radio interference and space  debris, she says light pollution is a bigger concern because there are  no rules in place. That means any path forward relies on the goodwill of  SpaceX and other companies.“It’s more of a philosophical question,” Donahue said. “It kind of  boils down to: How much do I trust corporate goodwill, and how much  would a corporation care about the opinion of people who care about  science and astronomy?”

SpaceX launches 60 additional Starlink satellites for global internet

The private rocket company founded by Elon Musk launched one of its reusable rockets from Cape Canaveral on Monday, to beam internet services around the world. But astronomers worry about the light po

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SpaceX launches 60 additional Starlink satellites for global internet

The private rocket company founded by Elon Musk launched one of its reusable rockets from Cape Canaveral on Monday, to beam internet services around the world. But astronomers worry about the light po... Read More

Latest News

On Everyone’s Radar

The private rocket company founded by Elon Musk launched one of its reusable rockets from Cape Canaveral on Monday, to beam internet services around the world. But astronomers worry about the light po