It's time to speak out against unchecked growth of satellite mega constellations

PaulHoule

Somebody should have spoken for fiber everywhere 15 years ago rather than telling us rural people to drop dead.

CamperBob2

It is truly a time of insanity. Why doesn't Musk just put the data centers on container ships, if he wants to avoid red tape?

verzali

A million satellites is implausible any time soon. You need to launch 300 a day for ten years straight without losing any. Just will not happen.

jiggawatts

The science fiction vision of our future is orbiting factories, massive space stations where you can take a holiday, captured asteroids mined for their precious metals, space elevators, etc... Many people think that this is realistic, eventually. The eventually is starting now. How exactly did people think it would happen? Someone clicks their fingers and we live in a sci-fi universe suddenly? Or that magically the entire space industry will restrict their orbits to a few narrow bands to preserve the oh-so-precious long exposure views of sunsets forever? These articles are just futile bleating. The future just isn't going to wait for grey-haired astronomers to catch up. PS: If we can launch satellite constellations cheaply enough to cause an issue for terrestrial telescopes, then almost by definition we can launch telescopes to space at a low enough cost to solve the problem and get a better vantage point without the pesky atmosphere in the way.

SilverElfin

I am absolutely frightened but the satellite constellation arms race. Especially by the Chinese companies that are launching constellations into very high orbits, where debris will take thousands of years to decay. These satellites are also ruining the night sky for astronomy. The public should not have to suffer for the greed of a few companies.