New satellites are messing up our night sky

[profdant139]

To me, dark skies are one of the main benefits of boondocking in remote territory -- it's a lot of work to get there, but the stars are astonishing.

So this article is depressing -- apparently, Elon Musk's new sat network is unusually reflective:

Article

I can probably edit out the "sat trails" from my star photos, but I am not happy.

[DallasSteve]

pnichols wrote:

Reisender wrote:

pnichols wrote:

pianotuna wrote:
Phil,

The deorbit is why he wants to launch 42,000 of them over a period of years.

Don,

Will a satellite melt away from those low alttitudes when it falls ... or should our descendants plan on living under heavy duty titanium roofs?

(Don't get me started on whether or not mankind "absolutely needs" the Internet on a world scale in order to survive.)

No more than we absolutely need electricity. But world wide internet improves access to healthcare for billions, education, employment, cultural awareness and a myriad of other things.

It sounds like you're an Internet convert. I just bought my first smartphone ... but I live in a place in the world where the Internet for me offers primarily only access to convenience - not necessity - and I've for some time begun to notice the every-growing downside to the Internet.

I don't see the long range logic in trying to compare electrical power for everyone to exposing everyone to the social and marketing aspects of the Internet. There are way more important things in life than for each and every person to know everything the whole world is up to on an instantaneous basis. IMHO, other interaction means are more suitable for enhancing the lives of people everywhere.

That's interesting. You know that you posted that message on the Internet, right?

[pnichols]

Reisender wrote:

pnichols wrote:

pianotuna wrote:
Phil,

The deorbit is why he wants to launch 42,000 of them over a period of years.

Don,

Will a satellite melt away from those low alttitudes when it falls ... or should our descendants plan on living under heavy duty titanium roofs?

(Don't get me started on whether or not mankind "absolutely needs" the Internet on a world scale in order to survive.)

No more than we absolutely need electricity. But world wide internet improves access to healthcare for billions, education, employment, cultural awareness and a myriad of other things.

It sounds like you're an Internet convert. I just bought my first smartphone ... but I live in a place in the world where the Internet for me offers primarily only access to convenience - not necessity - and I've for some time begun to notice the every-growing downside to the Internet.

I don't see the long range logic in trying to compare electrical power for everyone to exposing everyone to the social and marketing aspects of the Internet. There are way more important things in life than for each and every person to know everything the whole world is up to on an instantaneous basis. IMHO, other interaction means are more suitable for enhancing the lives of people everywhere.

[Reisender]

pnichols wrote:

pianotuna wrote:
Phil,

The deorbit is why he wants to launch 42,000 of them over a period of years.

Don,

Will a satellite melt away from those low alttitudes when it falls ... or should our descendants plan on living under heavy duty titanium roofs?

(Don't get me started on whether or not mankind "absolutely needs" the Internet on a world scale in order to survive.)

No more than we absolutely need electricity. But world wide internet improves access to healthcare for billions, education, employment, cultural awareness and a myriad of other things.

[pnichols]

pianotuna wrote:
Phil,

The deorbit is why he wants to launch 42,000 of them over a period of years.

Don,

Will a satellite melt away from those low alttitudes when it falls ... or should our descendants plan on living under heavy duty titanium roofs?

(Don't get me started on whether or not mankind "absolutely needs" the Internet on a world scale in order to survive.)

[pianotuna]

Phil,

The deorbit is why he wants to launch 42,000 of them over a period of years.

[pnichols]

babock wrote:

pnichols wrote:
Hmmmm .... I wonder how folks are going to like the latency issues with satellite Internet?

Geosynchronous is 22,236 miles. The Spacex satellites are at 217 miles.

pnichols wrote:
BTW, how's the research going into the/any subtle RF effects on humans?

If you are really worried about that, stop using your cell phone and turn off your wireless router. Turn off your computer while you are at it!

So ... satellites up there at only 217 (342?) miles are going to stay in orbit for how many years? (Of course Elon is probably developing a ground or spacecraft based laser cannon to melt them away near their end of service.)

That reminds me, what line-of-sight RF frequency bands will those SpaceX satellites transmit/receive at ... as compared to a cell phone, a wireless router, and a laptop computer? (I assume the medical research covers both cumulative RF strength and blended frequencies that bombard us humans?)

[DallasSteve]

pnichols wrote:

BTW, how's the research going into the/any subtle RF effects on humans?

🙂

You're safe as long as you don't take off your tin foil hat.

[babock]

pnichols wrote:
Hmmmm .... I wonder how folks are going to like the latency issues with satellite Internet?

Geosynchronous is 22,236 miles. The Spacex satellites are at 217 miles.

pnichols wrote:
BTW, how's the research going into the/any subtle RF effects on humans?

If you are really worried about that, stop using your cell phone and turn off your wireless router. Turn off your computer while you are at it!

[pianotuna]

Hi Phil,

That is way low earth orbit. "In May Elon was targeting 20ms initially improving to 10ms over time"

pnichols wrote:
Hmmmm .... I wonder how folks are going to like the latency issues with satellite Internet?

🙂

[Star_Gazer]

Horsedoc wrote:
How does one determine a star from a satellite if the satellite in is stationary orbit?

Very good question. I do astro photography and these kind of Geosynchronous satellites don't move is right, but the stars do. When I do long exposure images I am tracking at the same rate the stars move, actually as the earth rotates, and these satellites don't. So they end up being streaks in my exposures. Most of my final images are made up of many 10-30 min long exposures so with software we can remove these as random noise since they do not occur in the same location in each exposure. This will become extremely difficult when there are many objects in each exposure, and even though they may be too dim to see with the naked eye, my sensitive CCD camera will indeed pick them up.

So yes this is a major concern to many astronomers, both professional and amateurs alike.

Dean

[pnichols]

Hmmmm .... I wonder how folks are going to like the latency issues with satellite Internet?

The last time I checked, so far there's no way around the "C" in Einstein's equations accept to reduce distance between transmitter and receiver. In fact satellite Internet puts up-down 2X C between transmitter and receiver.

Transmission latency is one of the reasons I recently chose cable Internet instead of satellite Internet for our stick house.

BTW, how's the research going into the/any subtle RF effects on humans?

🙂

[DallasSteve]

If we don't do it, China, Russia, or somebody else will do it. I say more competition against my local cable company is good and maybe it will give us good, cheap(er), unlimited Internet for our RVs.

[pianotuna]

42k at 1,000.000.00 each = 42 billion dollars. The end users have to pay. It may be fast. It is not particularly portable such as a cell phone. The earth antenna is the size of a small to medium pizza.

[babock]

profdant139 wrote:
These aren't stationary, are they? I thought they were in low Earth orbit. Which means you can see them move against the background of the stars, and they will mess up long exposures. The sat trails will look like white lines going across the photo.

They aren't stationary which is the exact reason they are being put up. They can be closer to the earth than a geo stationary satellite.

I am actually looking forward to them. Great internet everywhere!

[profdant139]

These aren't stationary, are they? I thought they were in low Earth orbit. Which means you can see them move against the background of the stars, and they will mess up long exposures. The sat trails will look like white lines going across the photo.