The satellite Starlink would take a little too much space in the sky ? These days, they have wasted several times the observation of the comet Néowise.
And yet, the comet C/2020 F3 is rare, very rare, in the sky, since its next passage is provided in… 6800 years. Néowise is visible to the naked eye from France for a few days yet. An event for all lovers of astronomy, but also, of course, the astrophysicists.
The comet composed of ice and dust is located at 103 million miles from earth.
Light Pollution
Only here, in space, there are also hundreds of satellites Starlink, launched by SpaceX, the company of astronautics of Elon Musk and his rocket of the same name.
Result, when astronomers want to capture the passage of the comet Néowise, they sometimes have to deal with a real light pollution caused by satellites of the american billionaire.
The image, taken by the photographer Daniel Lopez and posted on his page in Facebook is evidence of this. It compile 17 photos of 30 seconds exposure. The white lines which spoil the landscape stellar are well as many satellites Starlink.
Not a first
This is not the first time that Elon Musk and its satellites cause the anger of astronomers. In November already, so that they were looking forward to a rain of meteorites, they were entitled to a flock of zebra stripes, bright, famous satellites.
Elon Musk had responded with a tweet announcing that he had asked the engineers of SpaceX to reduce the glare of the satellites. They clearly haven’t found the solution !
If the Starlink sow such a mess in the sky, it is mainly because they are placed in orbit at low altitude, that is to say, 346 kilometres, although they should logically be positioned 550 km above sea level. What’s more, the project of Elon Musk plans to over 7500 satellites on the same orbit.
Author(s): FranceSoir
