Mastodawn

Prof. Sam Lawler

I love love love love (in a sarcastic, dark humour sort of way) the title of the article Dr. Laura Revell, Dr. @astrokiwi.bsky.social and I wrote last week https://theconversation.com/a-new-space-race-could-turn-our-atmosphere-into-a-crematorium-for-satellites-276366.

But one thing got cut in the final edit: simulations of the night sky with 1 million satellites. I just tried to pitch a separate article on that, I'll see if that gets picked up this coming week or not.

A new space race could turn our atmosphere into a ‘crematorium for satellites’

Planned ‘megaconstellations’ of satellites could cause unforeseen harm to the ozone layer and climate systems. Global regulation is needed before it’s too late.

The Conversation

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Ready for a horror show that is different than the current news cycle?

This is code that @hannorein, Aaron Boley, and I put together for modelling Starlinks. We scaled up the brightness based on what we think could be the size of these stupid new "AI datacenters" that SpaceX says they will launch a million of, and used the orbits posted on @planet4589.bsky.social's website

I'll walk you through this plot in the following posts.

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Each of the grey circles is an all-sky plot, your zenith is the center of the circle. The rows are different latitudes, from 50N to the equator (it is mirrored in the southern hemisphere). The date is the Summer Solstice (N hemisphere). The first 2 columns show nautical dusk, the last 2 columns show midnight. Columns 1 and 3 show the SpaceX Orbital Data Centre, while Columns 2 and 4 show Starlink's 42,000 planned sats.

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

The dots in each grey circle are sunlit satellites, and the colour tells you how bright they are. Anything pink, orange, or yellow is naked-eye visible.

Below each circle is "Nvis" which tells you the number of satellites bright enough to be visible with the naked eye, and "Ntot" which is the total number of sunlit satellites above the horizon.

There are only ~4,500 stars that are naked eye visible.

A million sats this big would be more visible satellites than stars.

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Of course, there's no way in hell we'll ever get to 1 million satellites in orbit. We'll be in Kessler Syndrome long before that (many experts say we're already in Kessler Syndrome now, and the timescale between collisions will continue to get shorter).

I"ll also note we're making huge assumptions here on size and orbits, because SpaceX hasn't actually said what they're going to do. And that's fine with the FCC, they're going to approve it anyway. Fuckers.

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Want to tell the FCC not to approve this hideous, stupid, short-sighted megaconstellation? Instructions are available here: https://aas.org/posts/advocacy/2026/02/how-submit-comments-satellite-applications-fcc

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Just for "fun", for the next few minutes if you tell me your latitude, I'll put up a plot showing how many satellites would be visible in your night sky with 42,000 Starlink satellites and 1 million SpaceX AI datacenters, at midnight on the summer solstice.

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Sincere apologies for posting lots of plots without alt-text! I couldn't keep up.

I have to go work on other things now, so no more live plots posting.

In conclusion, SpaceX sucks.

@sundogplanets Yes, yes it does. So much yucky space trash!

Malcolm Herbert Mar 1

@sundogplanets S38

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Malcolm Herbert Mar 1

@sundogplanets I'm confused by the orientation on these images, sorry - do these represent a sky map? shouldn't most of the activity be north of my position in that case?

Malcolm Herbert Mar 1

@sundogplanets oh _northern hemisphere_ summer solstice?

Malcolm Herbert Mar 1

@sundogplanets it's still way too many - dad had a pretty capable telescope back in the day and he'd be horrified at the impact of these, even accounting for Melbourne's pretty bad light pollution already ...

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@mherbert On the summer solstice from the southern hemisphere, the sun is below your southern horizon during the night.

Malcolm Herbert Mar 1

@sundogplanets ... well, when you put it that way ... apologies

Laura "Tegan" Gjovaag ⛈ 🐸Mar 1

46° 19' 9.00"

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Laura "Tegan" Gjovaag ⛈ 🐸Mar 1

@sundogplanets
Holy flaming cows.

GeePawHill Mar 1

@sundogplanets 37° 53' 15.59" N

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@GeePawHill Oops that was the southern hemisphere version! (This is why I don't live-code)

GeePawHill Mar 1

@sundogplanets Awww, thanks for noticing!

Cheeseness Mar 1

@sundogplanets 41°26′ S

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Cheeseness Mar 1

@sundogplanets Yay ;_;

32º51'58" N

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

TY. What a mess.

Flipper 🐬🏳️‍🌈Mar 1

@sundogplanets 37.779° N

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Flipper 🐬🏳️‍🌈Mar 1

@sundogplanets this makes me sad

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@flipper I think I actually sent you the southern hemisphere version, oops.

Flipper 🐬🏳️‍🌈Mar 1

@sundogplanets That's 910 fewer satellites! That offsets my sadness marginally.

Legit_Spaghetti Mar 1

@sundogplanets 33.595

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@Legit_Spaghetti I assume north?

Legit_Spaghetti Mar 1

@sundogplanets Yup, and also oh god that is worse than even the most dystopian scifi. Harlan Ellison would look at the world they're trying to build and be like, "Dude. DUDE."

@Legit_Spaghetti @sundogplanets

@sundogplanets 35°32′8″ N

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Latitude: 25° 09' 60.00" N
Longitude: 121° 25' 59.99" E

Thank you!
@sundogplanets

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Thank you! @sundogplanets

Robert Bell Mar 1

39N
Oh, I’m already too slow! 😂

@sundogplanets
Congratulations on this work.

The geographical latitude of Frankfurt am Main Airport (FRA) is 50.026421° N.

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

Aleksi Stenberg Mar 1

@sundogplanets 61 °N

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@saruwine (of course, on your summer solstice you don't get nighttime, but here's a sim anyway!)

Aleksi Stenberg Mar 1

@sundogplanets Yeah, I did realize that but was still curious about what we would see here if it were darker. 😊

matthew green Mar 1

@sundogplanets 37.4N and 38.3S (live/from), thanks! this thread was hell

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@mrgtwentythree

matthew green Mar 1

@sundogplanets AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA thank you

I'm in Texas. 30° 40' 3" N

Prof. Sam Lawler Mar 1

@sundogplanets Uruguay 35° S 56° W

mivox is exhausted

@sundogplanets Very roughly: 65°N

Patrick Loftus 🖖

@sundogplanets 47°41'20.39" N -116°46'28.79" W

Sam Levine Mar 1

@sundogplanets Around 34N I think (I know LA is around 35 and I'm a bit south of that)

Patrick Hadfield Mar 1

@sundogplanets 55.57°N (Edinburgh).

Jim Hubbell Mar 1

@sundogplanets
41.67⁰North

Brad Rosenheim Mar 1

@sundogplanets Brightness is one thing (and bad enough). Would this magnitude of reflective satellites bring an appreciable amount of insolation to Earth's surface, or is that a non issue even at these numbers?