By: The opinion
for some years Millionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX company managed to create a network of Starlink satellites in low Earth orbit to offer satellite internet; however, now those artifacts are interfering with the work of the Hubble Space Telescope.
According to a recent study published in the journal Nature Astronomy, Starlink satellites have already photobombed to observations from telescopes on the ground and now even telescopes in space are no longer safe.
“The recent launch of low Earth orbit satellite constellations is creating a growing threat to astronomical observations with telescopes terrestrial that has alarmed the astronomical community”, reads the study.
The Hubble images striped with white lines show the impact of a single satellite flying through the field of view of the telescope. The proportion of Hubble images looking like this increases as more satellites fill Earth’s orbit, according to the study.
The new study estimates that the probability of seeing a satellite in a Hubble image was 3.7% between 2009 and 2020, but rose to 5.9% in 2021. That increase directly correlates with the increase in Starlink satellites, according to the study authors.
“With the increasing number of artificial satellites currently planned, the fraction of images from the Hubble Space Telescope traversed by satellites it will increase in the next decade and will need a more detailed study and follow-up”, warn the authors of the study.
The number of satellites will continue to grow
At the moment, the Starlink constellation now includes more than 3,000 satellites launched by SpaceX, as part of CEO Elon Musk’s vision to blanket the Earth with high-speed broadband internet.
Starlink plans to keep up to 42,000 satellites in orbit, an outrageously large number. For reference, in 2010 there were about 1,000 operational satellites in orbit.
Besides, China plans to launch a fleet of satellites to compete with the firm of the American tycoon and is expected to put into orbit around 13,000 devices.
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