Elon Musk’s SpaceX company has put thousands of satellites into orbit. Many people say they saw them in the sky.
They are part of the Starlink project, which aims to bring high-speed internet services from space to remote areas of the earth.
Starlink offers Internet services through a vast network of satellites.
It is aimed at people who live in remote areas and cannot get high-speed internet.
“There are people in the UK in that category, but more around the world, in places like Africa,” says Dr. Lucinda King, Space Projects Manager at the University of Portsmouth.
Starlink’s satellites were placed in low Earth orbit to make link speeds between the satellites and the ground as fast as possible.
However, a large number of low-level satellites are needed to provide full coverage of the globe.
Starlink is believed to have launched about 3,000 of them into space since 2018. 10,000 or 12,000 may be used, says Chris Hall.
“Using satellites solves the problem of connecting to remote locations in deserts and mountains,” he says.
“It circumvents the need to build massive amounts of infrastructure like cables and pylons to reach those areas.”
Compared to standard internet providers, Starlink does not come cheap.
It charges customers $99 per month (£89 per month in the UK). The dish and router needed to connect to the satellites cost $549 (£529 in the UK).
However, 96% of UK households already have access to high-speed internet, as do 90% of EU and US households.
“Most of the developed world is already well connected,” says Professor Sa’id Mosteshar of London University’s Institute of Space Policy and Law. “They rely on a small share of the market for revenue.”
The company says it has 400,000 subscribers across the 36 countries it currently covers – mostly in North America, Europe and Australasia. This applies to both households and companies.
Next year, Starlink plans to further expand its coverage to Africa and South America, as well as Asia – regions of the world where Internet coverage is more patchy.
“Starlink’s prices, for example, could be too high for many households in Africa,” says Chris Hall. “But it could play an important role in connecting schools and hospitals in remote areas there.”
As Russian forces advanced in Ukraine, they shut down Ukrainian internet services and attempted to block social media.
Elon Musk made Starlink available immediately after the invasion of Ukraine began. Around 15,000 sets of Starlink dishes and routers were shipped to the country.
“Starlink has kept things going, like public services and government,” says Chris Hall. “The Russians haven’t found a way to disable it.”
It was also used on the battlefield.
“Ukrainian armed forces use it for communication – for example between headquarters and troops in the field,” says Dr. Marina Miron, Researcher in Defense Studies at Kings College London.
“Its signals cannot be jammed like ordinary radio signals, and it only takes 15 minutes to set up the kit.”
In addition to Starlink, competitors such as OneWeb and Viasat, which also operate satellite internet services, are launching thousands of satellites into low-Earth orbit.
That will lead to problems, says Sa’id Mosteshar.
“This makes space increasingly unsafe in terms of collisions,” he says.
“Satellites could hit other ships and leave wreckage behind, which in turn could do a lot more damage at high speeds.”
There have been a number of near misses involving Starlink satellites recently, including near misses involving China’s space station.
“If there are too many fragments, it could make low-Earth orbit useless in the future,” says Dr. King from Portsmouth University.
“And we may not be able to get from low Earth orbit to higher orbits where our navigation satellites and telecommunications satellites are located.”
Starlink’s satellites are also causing problems for astronomers.
At sunrise and sunset they can be seen with the naked eye because the sun glistens on their wings.
This can cause streaks in telescopic images and affect the view of stars and planets.
“Astronomers recognized the problems early on,” says Professor Mosteshar. “They were the first to complain.”
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