Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye • Hacker News Board

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#21

Post by sharcerer » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:02 PM UTC

thanatos_dem wrote: post #15

Looks a lot like the cloud ark from Neil Stevenson’s hard science fiction book ”Seveneves”. The long of the short of it is that moon goes boom, kills life on earth, humanity survives onboard the ISS and a flurry of small habitation pods which are splayed out into a string so they share an orbit, but isolated in case they get hit by space debris. The book came out in 2015, and despite having a fictional plot, nearly a…

that novel was amazing. I loved the 5000 year jump too. Although I found it difficult to visualize some of the futuristic parts. I think a movie is being made based on the novel.

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#22

Post by Kutta » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:05 PM UTC

childintime wrote: post #5

Counted 52 spots, plus an additional 2 which only appeared briefly and dimly, a little off the track of the others. 4 or 5 dots seem to be pairs. So that acounts for pretty much all satellites. I'd like to experience this for myself. With 12000 of them the sky will be quite littered with them though. Astronomy will never be the same again.

You can only see LEO satellites near dawn and dusk. They are in shadow most of the time at night.

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#23

Post by anthuman » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:09 PM UTC

I respect and admire the risks Musk is willing to take and am amazed that he is able to find financial backers for his projects.

But I have to wonder whether the internet connection can be maintained during cloudy days and what the expected upload/download speeds will be and finally what the expected costs will be.

Affordable and globally available internet could be a game-changer. If viable, couldn't it challenge wireless carriers and ISPs?

Also, aren't there geopolitical ramifications. Would China, Russia, EU, etc allow their citizens to access the starlink system? Or will starlink have to be censored, filtered and monitored in these regions?

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#24

Post by CorvusCrypto » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:12 PM UTC

dahfizz wrote: post #17

CorvusCrypto wrote: post #6

Okay that's interesting but I have to say it's also quite ugly. Is this a new trend to cluster satellites like this? If so what advantage does it bring and is it worth that ugly streak appearing in the night? I get this comment is very subjective but surely I'm not the only one thinking it's a bit of an eyesore

Is it uglier than telephone poles and huge cell towers everywhere? Of all the infrastructure humans build out, this is probably going to be one of the least eyesore.

That's good then. And no I don't think it's uglier. You're right that many of the billboards and such are ugly but I still believe this to be ugly as well and I don't thing something being uglier invalidates it

Someone else commented something that puts me at more ease but it is worrying at first glance.

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#25

Post by CorvusCrypto » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:13 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #11

CorvusCrypto wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmmm well I hope it's not noticeable because starlink is planning 24 orbital planes with 60 satellites per. With that it's safe to say you could see up to 50 or so of them in a night due to the constellation pattern. That's a lot of flickering and moving light in the sky when coupled with AWS' initiative also. I'm hoping your right but at first glance it doesn't seem great.

There are well over a thousand operational satellites in low earth orbit currently, plus I don’t know how many dead ones. Have you noticed those? They’re only visible for about an hour after sunset, since the satellite itself still has to be illuminated to be visible.

Hmm no. That does put me at more ease.

And yeah I included that last part in the estimate for seeing up to 50, otherwise the projection would be of course up to half of all of them.

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#26

Post by CorvusCrypto » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:18 PM UTC

Kutta wrote: post #22

childintime wrote: post #5

Counted 52 spots, plus an additional 2 which only appeared briefly and dimly, a little off the track of the others. 4 or 5 dots seem to be pairs. So that acounts for pretty much all satellites. I'd like to experience this for myself. With 12000 of them the sky will be quite littered with them though. Astronomy will never be the same again.

You can only see LEO satellites near dawn and dusk. They are in shadow most of the time at night.

That doesn't make it better imo, though someone commented under my other response to this that in reality it wouldn't be so noticeable which is good. The moment it makes a noticeable and lingering change in the sky picture, however, I would hope people accept that it would be time to reduce the clutter

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#27

Post by thanatos_dem » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:19 PM UTC

sharcerer wrote: post #21

thanatos_dem wrote: post #15

Looks a lot like the cloud ark from Neil Stevenson’s hard science fiction book ”Seveneves”. The long of the short of it is that moon goes boom, kills life on earth, humanity survives onboard the ISS and a flurry of small habitation pods which are splayed out into a string so they share an orbit, but isolated in case they get hit by space debris. The book came out in 2015, and despite having a fictional plot, nearly a…

that novel was amazing. I loved the 5000 year jump too. Although I found it difficult to visualize some of the futuristic parts. I think a movie is being made based on the novel.

I’m a bit nervous about the movie, unless they pull a Deathly Hallows and split it into two films. The audio book is 32 hours long. That’s a lot to pack into a ~2 hour movie.

But that’s a pretty big risk to do with a single novel. Harry Potter had a massive and loyal fan base by the time the 7th and 8th movies came out.

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#28

Post by [deleted] » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:41 PM UTC

dahfizz wrote: post #17

CorvusCrypto wrote: post #6

Okay that's interesting but I have to say it's also quite ugly. Is this a new trend to cluster satellites like this? If so what advantage does it bring and is it worth that ugly streak appearing in the night? I get this comment is very subjective but surely I'm not the only one thinking it's a bit of an eyesore

Is it uglier than telephone poles and huge cell towers everywhere? Of all the infrastructure humans build out, this is probably going to be one of the least eyesore.

[deleted]

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#29

Post by Robotbeat » Sat, May 25, 2019, 5:57 PM UTC

CorvusCrypto wrote: post #26

Kutta wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can only see LEO satellites near dawn and dusk. They are in shadow most of the time at night.

That doesn't make it better imo, though someone commented under my other response to this that in reality it wouldn't be so noticeable which is good. The moment it makes a noticeable and lingering change in the sky picture, however, I would hope people accept that it would be time to reduce the clutter

This has been the case since the dawn of spaceflight. Iridium flares in particular have been noticeable even in daytime.

Far less of a problem than airplane lights let alone city lights for the enjoyment of the night sky. The ISS is MUCH larger and brighter.

Re: Starlink satellite-train visible with the naked eye

#30

Post by CorvusCrypto » Sat, May 25, 2019, 6:02 PM UTC

Robotbeat wrote: post #29

CorvusCrypto wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't make it better imo, though someone commented under my other response to this that in reality it wouldn't be so noticeable which is good. The moment it makes a noticeable and lingering change in the sky picture, however, I would hope people accept that it would be time to reduce the clutter

This has been the case since the dawn of spaceflight. Iridium flares in particular have been noticeable even in daytime. Far less of a problem than airplane lights let alone city lights for the enjoyment of the night sky. The ISS is MUCH larger and brighter.

This is tired logic. The fact remains that if I go out and look up in the sky and see moving lights, I'm going to be annoyed. Airplane, satellite, whatever, it's not a good experience and it is absolutely a problem still regardless of the comparison to other problems. However someone said it would be rare. As long as I don't look up and see non-natural moving lights in the sky I'm cool with it.