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Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

nytimes.com

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Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#61

Post by SiempreViernes »

DoingIsLearning wrote: post #49
shajznnckfke wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This overstates the problem I think. It will be an issue for wide-field astronomy. On the other hand, even with tens of thousands of satellites, they will only be covering a tiny fraction of the sky. For narrow-field you should be unobstructed most of the time, and able to turn the sensor off momentarily when the odd satellite is going to obstruct you.

> This overstates the problem I think. It will be an issue for wide-field astronomy. I think you are downplaying the problem. They are already reporting issues with Starlinks and there are "only" a few hundred of them right now, Amazon wants to deploy 3k low orbiting satellites. Look at this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_astronomical_observato... The very large majority of the world's observatories are…

Very bright, enough to contaminate all frames, and rapidly moving: have fun doing long exposures to spot faint objects most visible in twilight with those options. Maybe starlink is actually a sneaky way to up the Mars mission priority by mucking up the near earth object searches? /s

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#62

Post by Isinlor »

nelaboras wrote: post #51
nindalf wrote: post #35

The two problems pointed by the article - light pollution caused by high reflectivity and potential crashes appear to be difficult to solve because solving one makes the other worse. If the satellites tried to become more difficult to detect, perhaps with light absorbent coating they would also become more difficult to detect by other satellites in orbit.

There already was this story of a $bn research satellite having to dodge a throwaway SoaceX satellite. Real issue is accountability and the difference in risk and cost - SpaceX should pay for the reduced lifetime of this satellite (as it costs fuel to change height). https://www.esa.int/Safety_Security/ESA_spacecraft_dodges_la... With many more satellites on the way there will be more such stories.

Collision avoidance is standard practice in the satellite industry.

Here is Iridium CEO: https://twitter.com/IridiumBoss/status/1168582141128650753

BTW - Satellite operators (including governments) are currently the only customers of SpaceX. Their interests are SpaceX interests.

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#63

Post by dogma1138 »

briga wrote: post #12

It's a little baffling how monstrously big Amazon has become over the years. Pretty soon there won't be an industry left untouched by Amazon's tentacles. Hard to see how they can continue down this path without getting broken up. On the bright side: each new satellite launch should lower the barrier to entry for the next satellite launch. This combined with growing competition in the space industry could lead the way…

I am still waiting for them to go into housing, with prefab and automation seems like the logical next step.

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#64

Post by radegast »

P4wl0w wrote: post #41
P4wl0w wrote: post #40

This is a placeholder for an opinion I would express if I would not get flamed and downvoted all the time I do this on a controversial topic like AMZN.

And this is prove to how toxic this community is - I am leaving now. Have fun with your platform you hateful people.

dont let the door hit you on the way out

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#65

Post by rscho »

systemcluster wrote: post #57
rscho wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amazon works toward improving mine and millions of others daily lives ... thousands of small businesses and millions of retail workers are so thankful for this "improvement". The day is nigh where you and I will also get "improved", hopefully!

Occupations are always made obsolete when society advances as a whole and better solutions become available. We would not have progress otherwise.

And one day we'll all be obsolete, implying we won't be able to show our value through our work.

Brave New World. Ideal for a certain social class: the alphas.

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#66

Post by [deleted] »

systemcluster wrote: post #57
rscho wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amazon works toward improving mine and millions of others daily lives ... thousands of small businesses and millions of retail workers are so thankful for this "improvement". The day is nigh where you and I will also get "improved", hopefully!

Occupations are always made obsolete when society advances as a whole and better solutions become available. We would not have progress otherwise.

[deleted]

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#67

Post by Google234 »

scroogeydop wrote: post #31
roughly wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's definitely fair. Per the article, there's currently ~2600 satellites in orbit; Amazon is looking to more than double that, and SpaceX is asking to add ~16x that number. I think we're well within our rights as society and as humans generally to put the onus on them not to fuck up astronomy for the next century. And since when has "It's difficult" been a free pass? Both of those companies beat their chests about h…

Time to start building tools to jam the spectrum. Make these things useless.

This is very illegal.

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#68

Post by bryanlarsen »

The article is behind a paywall so I don't know how much is FUD and fear-mongering. These are real concerns but SpaceX has already addressed them.

1: risk of collision. The main mitigation measure here is active collision detection. The second mitigation measure is that all of SpaceX's satellites will be in an incredibly low orbit that decays rapidly without active station keeping. If a satellite fails it will burn up in the atmosphere within a couple of years.

2: light pollution. The latest generation of SpaceX satellites with the visor are so dark that they are not visible to the naked eye. This is dark enough that blooming is not a concern. Of course they'll still be visible in telescopes but that doesn't ruin the shot the way blooming does.

I suppose it's possible that Amazon doesn't address concerns the way SpaceX does, but it seems unlikely now that SpaceX has proven it can be done.

Re: Amazon satellites add to astronomers' worries about night sky

#69

Post by missedthecue »

echelon wrote: post #55
missedthecue wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's regrettable and bitterly discouraging that the more Amazon works toward improving mine and millions of others daily lives, the closer they get to being broken up. At least, that's the way I see it. They've added new competition in so many areas. They've saved the consumer so much money that the federal reserve literally blamed them for lowering inflation, but instead, the federal government as painfully ironic a…

How would you feel if Amazon entered your market and killed your company? What if it takes them zero effort to do so?

I wouldn't like it of course, but the consumer would win, and it wouldn't be right to sic the government on them because I get outcompeted. Government shouldn't be doing any favors for business, big or small.
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