Starlink Satellites Tracker • Hacker News Board

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#31

Post by Causality1 » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:42 PM UTC

Diederich wrote: post #5

bowmessage wrote: post #4

We are polluting our night skies and dark places.

Go outside this evening if the sky is clear. If you're anywhere between 30 degrees and 60 degrees, there are multiple starlink satellites in your line of sight all the time. Can you point them out? No, they're invisible at their operational altitude.

Even if they weren't, we can't have everything. Do you know how crippled a huge chunk of the world's population is without robust internet access? I have two telescopes in my house and I would give up looking at the sky forever if it meant my cousin's kids got to attend Zoom class instead of having to work from take-home materials.

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#32

Post by SquibblesRedux » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:45 PM UTC

Every now and then I need to compile lists of locations for this or that application. The drop-down of locations in this tracker is very interesting. Does anyone know how the list was compiled?

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#33

Post by herewulf » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:47 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #15

I honestly can't believe Starlink is allowed to do this. It's an absolute travesty, polluting the view of the sky for ALL people on Earth to an absolutely unprecedented degree, for profit of an American corporation. Absolutely despise it, wish all countries of the world came together and demanded the deployments to stop.

I'm curious if you say the same thing about airplanes (which aren't exclusively American either). They are also quite noisy.

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#34

Post by Kiro » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:47 PM UTC

bowmessage wrote: post #4

We are polluting our night skies and dark places.

So what? What is the higher purpose of not "polluting" the night sky?

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#35

Post by callumprentice » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:47 PM UTC

modeless wrote: post #24

callumprentice wrote: post #2

This is my favorite Starlink tracker - also has a nice integration with Google Street View and shows you exactly where to look. https://james.darpinian.com/satellites/?special=starlink EDIT: Removed "past times" parameter as suggested in comments. Also note you can remove also see loads of other satellites with an unadorned URL : https://james.darpinian.com/satellites

Thanks! I suggest removing the showPastTimes parameter from the link: https://james.darpinian.com/satellites/?special=starlink

I wondered about that but I wasn't able to see the Street View integration without it - I think you're right though - better without the past ones. Thank you.

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#36

Post by grecy » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:49 PM UTC

ortusdux wrote: post #26

amackera wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the info!

Absolutely! Things will be really interesting when they can use Starships to launch batches. I've seen estimates that they could launch 600 starlink satellites at a time. They could theatrically also launch fewer, but put them all the way into their final orbit, skipping the few weeks of light pollution.

> They could theatrically also launch fewer, but put them all the way into their final orbit

I wonder if they might choose to do this so the sats keep more of their onboard fuel, and will be able to keep themselves in orbit a bit longer before the inevitable re-entry burn up.

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#37

Post by Diederich » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:51 PM UTC

User23 wrote: post #12

Diederich wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go outside this evening if the sky is clear. If you're anywhere between 30 degrees and 60 degrees, there are multiple starlink satellites in your line of sight all the time. Can you point them out? No, they're invisible at their operational altitude.

That depends on how dark the area is. I heard that in a Bortle 5 or lower area they are naked eye visible, which really sucks for stargazers. Especially since some of the more interesting naked eye observations have to be done using peripheral vision.

I've been unable to see them in class 2 areas.

I'm a pretty ardent stargazer.

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#38

Post by Isinlor » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:53 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #15

I honestly can't believe Starlink is allowed to do this. It's an absolute travesty, polluting the view of the sky for ALL people on Earth to an absolutely unprecedented degree, for profit of an American corporation. Absolutely despise it, wish all countries of the world came together and demanded the deployments to stop.

You would have to convince UK that owns 42% equity of the OneWeb company that plans to launch initially 648-satellite constellation.

You will probably sooner see EU, Russia and China decide that it is their strategic interest to have their own constellations. As it was with GPS. Currently we have the United States' Global Positioning System (GPS), Russia's Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS), China's BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) and the European Union's Galileo.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OneWeb

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OneWeb_satellite_constellation

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#39

Post by gambiting » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:53 PM UTC

fighterpilot wrote: post #25

gambiting wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Starlink is polluting the sky for people who cannot buy its services, and who don't appreciate yet another American corporation invading into their lives, this time taking the very view of the night sky.

Then tax SpaceX for the light-pollution externality until they fix it (which they say they're going to do). I don't think depriving rural communities and poor countries of access to the internet is really the best solution to such a non-problem.

What are you talking about?? Here in Poland(which isn't a poor country!) You can't even buy Starlink here, our astronomical organisations are already complaining about the pollution of the sky, but how can Poland tax an American corporation polluting our sky????

So the question should be - how can an American corporation deprive other countries of accessible view of the sky for profit and get away with it? Because it might be accessible by everyone eventually? That's frankly not good enough. Elon Musk isn't doing this as a charity, but even if it was it still wouldn't be acceptable.

Re: Starlink Satellites Tracker

#40

Post by Diederich » Fri, May 07, 2021, 9:54 PM UTC

Causality1 wrote: post #31

Diederich wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go outside this evening if the sky is clear. If you're anywhere between 30 degrees and 60 degrees, there are multiple starlink satellites in your line of sight all the time. Can you point them out? No, they're invisible at their operational altitude.

Even if they weren't, we can't have everything. Do you know how crippled a huge chunk of the world's population is without robust internet access? I have two telescopes in my house and I would give up looking at the sky forever if it meant my cousin's kids got to attend Zoom class instead of having to work from take-home materials.

Exactly.

This is akin to people complaining about how wind mills ruin their views of things.

I know that these sats will affect many telescopic observations, but that's been happening a long time. In most cases, satellite streaks are algorithmically removed.