SpaceX's low-flying satellites appear as mysterious 'UFO' in night sky; astronomers bugged

A string of lights that lobbed across night sky in parts of US on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday h some people wondering if a fleet of UFOs was coming, but it h ors mostly amateur stargazers and professional astronomers lamenting industrialization of space.

train of lights was actually a series of relatively low-flying satellites launched by Elon Musk's SpaceX as part of its Starlink internet service earlier this week. Callers swamped TV stations from Texas to Wisconsin reporting lights and musing about UFOs. Astronomy experts said number of lights in quick succession and ir distance from Earth me m easily identifiable as Starlink satellites for those who are used to seeing m.

" way you can tell y are Starlink satellites is y are like a string of pearls, se lights travelling in same basic orbit, one right after or," said Dr Richard Fienberg, press officer for American Astronomical Society.

Fienberg said satellites that are being launched in large groups called constellations string toger when y orbit, especially right after launching. strings get smaller as time goes on.

SpaceX launches multiple satellites

This month, SpaceX has alrey launched dozens of satellites. It is all part of a plan to bridge digital divide and bring internet access to underserved areas of world, with SpaceX tentatively scheduled to launch anor 120 satellites later in month. Overall, company has sent about 1,500 satellites into orbit and has asked for permission to launch thousands more.

But prior to recent years, re were maybe a few hundred satellites total orbiting Earth, mostly visible as individual lights moving across sky, Fienberg said. or handful of companies that are planning to or have launched satellite constellations have not launched recently and largely pushed m into orbit at a farr distance from Earth, he said.

Fienberg's group as well as ors that represent both professional and amateur stargazers don't love proliferation of satellites that can obscure scientific data and ruin a clear night of watching universe. International Astronomical Union issued a statement in July 2019 noting concern about multiple satellite launches.

organisation, in general, embraces principle of a dark and rio-quiet sky as not only essential to vancing our understanding of Universe of which we are a part, but also as a resource for all humanity and for protection of nocturnal wildlife, union's representatives wrote. y noted that light reflection can interfere with astronomical research, but rio waves can also cause problems for specialized research equipment such as those that captured first images of a black hole.

Fienberg said re is no real regulation of light pollution from satellites, but SpaceX has voluntarily worked to mitigate that by creating visors that dampen satellites' reflection of sunlight. y've me significant progress in just two years, he said, but many hope that satellites will someday be at such a low magnitude that y will not be visible to naked eye even at dusk or dawn.

Fienberg noted a massive telescope being built in Chile, costing millions of dollars and a dece of planning. telescope will capture a huge swath of sky in Sourn hemisphere and take continual pictures to record a sort of movie that will show universe changing. Because of its size, nearly eight meters across, massive telescope could also le to discovery of dimmer objects in night sky, he said.

plan is for telescope to start recording in 2023. And with plans for thousands of satellites, Fienberg said it's hard to imagine that y won't cause issues with data since re's no way to correct for ir lights and know what amount of light should be emitted from any dimmer objects behind path of satellites, which could also create ghost images in data.

We're talking with companies now and hoping to continue to make progress, and potentially by time it goes into operation, have tools and techniques to correct for lights and perhaps fainter satellites, Fienberg said. We can't say this is wrong and you have to stop because point is to provide internet access to whole globe. It's an mirable goal, that we would support if it didn't mean giving up something else... night sky.