Astronomers are concerned about the AST SpaceMobile's satellite BlueWalker3 becoming one of the brightest objects in the night sky as satellite constellations expand in the past few years.
According to a study published by Nature Monday (October 2), the satellite - launched in September 2022 and has since unfurled into an expansive array extending across nearly 700 square feet (around 35 sqm) on low earth orbit (LEO) - has since become one of the brightest objects in the sky, outshining some of the most radiant stars in the Milky Way.
History is unfolding! We've deployed #BlueWalker3's 693-square-foot array, which is now the largest-ever commercial communications array in low Earth orbit.
— AST SpaceMobile (@AST_SpaceMobile) November 14, 2022
Read more about this important milestone here: https://t.co/4kupfxn3vO pic.twitter.com/KnE9CeWOCT
Astronomers: Satellites Interfere with Stargazing
The concerns brought by astronomers were not the first time. They have been complaining about the emergence of satellite mega-constellations, such as SpaceX's Starlink, especially its early iterations, which have shiny surfaces that, at times, interfere with views of space from the ground.
"The issue is not necessarily that one satellite," University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign astrophysicist Siegfried Eggl said, "but that it is a predecessor or prototype of a constellation, so there's going to be a lot of those out there eventually."
Eggl is also an author of the new study.
According to the New York Times, the rapid proliferation of satellites in recent years has also alarmed stargazers of different backgrounds as satellite constellations might create bright trails and an ambient glow in the night sky that could astronomical images and obscure fainter celestial objects that would otherwise be visible to the naked eye.
About the Company and Satellite
AST SpaceMobile is one of many companies racing to serve the expanding demand for global broadband connectivity. Aside from SpaceX, Amazon and OneWeb are planning to expand their own communication satellite mega-constellations.
"At the moment, there are 18 constellations that we know are planned all over the world," Eggl added. "The total number of satellites is a stunning half a million that people are planning to put up there. This is 100 times more than we already have."
According to an AST SpaceMobile spokesperson, BlueWalker3 aims to serve as a network of orbital cell towers with the goal "to democratize access to knowledge and information regardless of where people live and work," with the satellite successfully relayed its first 5G connection to a smartphone in a cellular coverage gap on Earth.
