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I'm surprised by HN opinions on this. Astronomy misconception plus Kessler syndrome worries are two biggest faulty views on SpaceX and now Amazon. As one delet

by klohto 6y ago

I'm surprised by HN opinions on this. Astronomy misconception plus Kessler syndrome worries are two biggest faulty views on SpaceX and now Amazon. As one deleted comment stated: "Stacking images and object detection can pretty much nullify this problem. Worst case scenario you throw out a couple minutes of data. It might add an extra step to data processing which is unfortunate but in the vast majority of cases won't be a problem." Pretty much sums it up. This is a problem that has been blown out of proportions by media. Sure, amateur astronomy will take a slight hit, but it is nowhere the issue being presented. Kessler syndrome doesn't apply at altitude so low and all of the satellites are brought by gravity in few months, they need constant readjustments to stay in low orbit.

dylan604 6y ago
it's a problem now, yet it will only get worse at the entire Starlink fleet is fully deployed. There's only a few hundred of the thousands from Starlink alone. It will be impossible to get a single clean image. It's not the small problem you seem to suggest
- yazaddaruvala 6y ago
  Lets do the math. We are talking about (at most - including other future companies) roughly 50,000 satellites in LEO, each about the size of a car, and they burn up in the atmosphere in a few years. Given LEO is at a higher altitude, the "surface area" at that orbit is larger, but lets pretend its only 510 million km^2 (i.e. Earth's surface area). If I evenly distributed 50,000 cars across 510 million km^2, you would need to search 10,200 km^2 to find 1 car. Even 1 satellite per 1 km^2 in LEO would not impede astronomy, and that future requires 500+ million such satellites. Amazon and SpaceX operating roughly 0.01 million satellites each is inconsequential.
wmf 6y ago
I don't know if you're seeing an accurate sample of HN opinion because of the "101" effect where every thread turns into a low-quality FAQ.

by klohto 6y ago

dylan604 6y ago

it's a problem now, yet it will only get worse at the entire Starlink fleet is fully deployed. There's only a few hundred of the thousands from Starlink alone. It will be impossible to get a single clean image. It's not the small problem you seem to suggest

yazaddaruvala 6y ago
Lets do the math. We are talking about (at most - including other future companies) roughly 50,000 satellites in LEO, each about the size of a car, and they burn up in the atmosphere in a few years. Given LEO is at a higher altitude, the "surface area" at that orbit is larger, but lets pretend its only 510 million km^2 (i.e. Earth's surface area). If I evenly distributed 50,000 cars across 510 million km^2, you would need to search 10,200 km^2 to find 1 car. Even 1 satellite per 1 km^2 in LEO would not impede astronomy, and that future requires 500+ million such satellites. Amazon and SpaceX operating roughly 0.01 million satellites each is inconsequential.

wmf 6y ago

I don't know if you're seeing an accurate sample of HN opinion because of the "101" effect where every thread turns into a low-quality FAQ.