The story begins with a signature on a license. In July 2020, the Federal Communications Commission gave Amazon permission to fly 3,236 satellites in low-Earth orbit, the formal go-ahead for Project Kuiper, a network meant to carry high-speed internet to the whole planet. The conditions were strict: half the constellation had to be launched and operating by 2026, with the full network in place by 2029, as Space News reported at the time.
For those involved on the ground, the stakes were straightforward. Roughly 2,600 satellites were orbiting Earth when the approval landed, and Amazon’s plan alone would multiply that number. The company’s own words, from its April 2019 unveiling, promised “a constellation of low Earth orbit satellites that will provide low-latency, high-speed broadband connectivity to unserved and underserved communities around the world”, a footprint spanning the 56th parallel north to the 56th parallel south and, on paper, about 95 percent of humanity.
What Astronomers Saw Coming
What unfolded next was a quiet argument about the sky itself. Satellite operators were already performing about three collision avoidance maneuvers a day, and experts quoted by Scientific American estimated the count could climb toward eight every hour as constellations multiplied. A crash would scatter debris clouds capable of triggering chain reactions. As a condition of its license, Amazon had to submit a debris mitigation plan to the FCC once its spacecraft design was final.
Brightness was the other fight. Satellites can shine as brightly as Polaris, and the first Starlink batch had already drawn howls from astronomers who found white streaks cutting through their exposures. SpaceX’s answer, in May 2020, was a visor to keep sunlight off the reflective antennas and a tilt to throw less light back down. One Vox projection had the coming satellite swarm outnumbering the roughly 9,000 stars a person can see from the ground, less light pollution than sky pollution, visible even in the darkest places. Radio emissions threatened radio astronomy too.
No Air Traffic Control
The deeper worry was governance. Julien H. Girard, a scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, put the scientific cost politely: “There’s no doubt that the astronomical community can still do science with the presence of those constellations, but it’s a burden”. Michele Bannister, a New Zealand astronomer at the University of Canterbury, was blunter. “We don’t yet have any kind of industrywide guidelines,” she told the New York Times, describing an industry with no body enforcing good corporate citizenship and no regulatory framework handing down clear rules. Her closing image stuck: “To me, honestly, it feels like putting a bunch of planes up and then not having air traffic control.”
At its heart, the 2020 nod was a bet that the sky could absorb thousands of new machines faster than anyone had ever tried. Amazon had rivals moving at its own pace, with SpaceX already flying hundreds of Starlink craft and cleared for more than 12,000, and OneWeb’s plans hanging in bankruptcy. The license set the clock; the sky, and the astronomers watching it, kept the score.
Sources
- How Will Amazon’s Planned Satellite Megaconstellation Impact the Night Sky?
- Amazon plans to launch a 3,236-strong constellation of satellites
