This article was originally published here Conversation. (opens in new tab) The publication submitted the article to Space.com Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
Michael JI Brown (opens in new tab)Associate Professor of Astronomy, Monash University
The night sky is a common desert. On a dark night, far from the city lights, you can see it stars as your ancestors did centuries ago. you can see Milky Way and constellations associated with stories of mythical hunters, sisters, and journeys.
But like any desert, the night sky can be polluted. since Sputnik 1 In 1957, thousands satellites and pieces of space debris launched into orbit.
For now, satellites crossing the night sky are of great interest. But this may change with the emergence of satellite constellations of hundreds or thousands of satellites.
Related: 10 Weird Things About SpaceX’s Starlink Internet Satellites
Recently presented BlueWalker 3 (opens in new tab), a prototype of a satellite constellation, raises the prospect of bright satellites polluting our night sky. Its area is 64 square meters the largest commercial communications satellite (opens in new tab) in low Earth orbit – and very bright.
Pollution of the night sky
Although the detection of satellites in the night sky is of interest, the increasing number of satellites in orbit means that night sky pollution can become a serious problem.
On a clear night, especially near dusk, you can see satellites traveling across the night sky. These satellites are in low Earth orbit, only a few hundred kilometers above Place and travels almost 8 kilometers every second.
Programs (opens in new tab) and websites (opens in new tab) allows you to identify or predict the arrival of certain satellites. And it’s really fun to see International Space Station we realized that there was a crew of astronauts on that particle of light.
But in the last few years, the rate of launching satellites has increased. SpaceX made satellite launches cheaper and launched thousands of satellites Starlink satellites providing internet services.
Each puts about 50 Starlink satellites into orbit Sahin 9 rocket and first produces a brilliant train of satellites. These were produced first UFO reported on this (opens in new tab)but it is now common enough not to be particularly newsworthy.
After the Starlink satellites break up and move into their operational orbits, they approach the limit of what can be seen with the naked eye.
However, such satellites are bright enough to produce trails in images taken by telescopes. These tracks write on the stars and galaxies below them, can only be fixed by taking additional pictures. Short transient events such as a gamma-ray burst (opens in new tab)potentially lost.
BlueWalker 3
While Starlink is the largest satellite constellation in service with thousands of satellites in orbit, others are planned.
Amazon’s Blue Origin plans to launch more than 3,200 Project Kuiper (opens in new tab) satellites and AST SpaceMobile (opens in new tab) plans to launch 100 BlueBirds (opens in new tab) satellites (and maybe more).
The recently released BlueBird prototype, BlueWalker 3, has caused quite a stir among astronomers.
Although BlueWalker 3 was initially quite weak, it opened up a 64-square-meter communications array—roughly the size of a squash court. This wide surface reflects sunlight very well, and the BlueWalker 3 is now as bright as some of the brightest stars in the night sky.
It is possible that BlueBird satellites are operational could be even bigger (opens in new tab) and brighter.
Too many of these bright satellites can be bad—very bad. If there were thousands of moons this bright, you couldn’t look at the night sky without seeing the sometimes bright moons.
With the almost constant reminder of technology in our skies, we would lose that sense of wilderness.
It could have a major impact on professional astronomy. Brighter satellites cause more damage to astronomical images than fainter satellites.
In addition, many of these satellites broadcast at radio frequencies that can interfere with radio astronomy, radio waves (opens in new tab) where remote sites above radio observatories observe the heavens (opens in new tab).
On the cliff?
What happens next is uncertain. The The International Astronomical Union has sounded the alarm about satellite constellations and BlueWalker 3 in particular.
However, confirmation of satellite constellations US Federal Communications Commission (opens in new tab) environmental impact has been relatively little taken into account.
It has recently been mentioned as a major problem by US Government Accountability Office (opens in new tab)however, it is unclear whether this will lead to concrete change.
We may be on the brink. Will the night sky be filled with bright artificial satellites for the sake of the Internet or 5G? Or will we step back and preserve the night sky as a globally shared wilderness?
This article is being republished Conversation (opens in new tab) Under Creative Commons license. read it original article (opens in new tab).
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