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Lyrid Meteor Shower It may have peaked in the UK yesterday, but that doesn’t mean you can’t see another heavenly display going over tonight.
A series of satellites known as Starlink pass through the UK throughout this week, creating a fascinating string of moving lights in the night sky.
The satellites come from SpaceX, the private space company founded by Elon Musk, and are designed to transmit an Internet signal to the entire planet. There are currently 300 Starlink satellites in place, but SpaceX aims to eventually have 12,000 in orbit around the planet.
The satellites will pass over the UK tonight and move across the sky from west to east.
Starlink satellites will pass through the UK in 9.34pm this afternoon and the passage through the sky will last about six minutes.
The viewing conditions for the satellites are good at the moment thanks to the dark New Moon in the sky and the lack of clouds.
While you can’t always see Starlink satellites (there are different satellite “trains”, some brighter than others) than clearly, tonight’s display should be ideal.
“Initially, the separation of the satellites and their proximity to the planet’s surface means that they look like a ‘string of shiny pearls’ in the night sky, making them very easy to detect,” wrote Malika Andress of the National Space Center. on a recent blog. Send. “But over time they distance themselves from each other and move further into space, making them less obvious to the casual observer.”
‘When we can see them, we call them flares (like the famous Iridium flares that you can see from Iridium communication satellites). This happens when you on Earth, the satellite and the Sun are positioned in such a way that the Sun is reflected from the satellite towards you.
‘As a result, many of the passes will be” invisible “to us, even if they are directly overhead. This is also the reason why they appear suddenly and disappear so suddenly: as soon as the angle is wrong, you can no longer see the reflected light. “
Each Starlink satellite is about the size of a car and moves on a very different line through the night sky.
SpaceX is shipping them in batches of 60, with the most recent release in mid-March. The National Space Center in Leicester said each batch deployed in an orbit about 180 miles above Earth and had moved about 340 miles away.
People have reported seeing satellites across the country in London, Manchester and Leeds, as well as across Europe.
Make sure you are outside (or near a window) and look up at 9.34 this afternoon. Look for the Plow constellation if you need to get your bearings, as the satellites must pass in front as they cross the skies.
If you want to follow the movements of the satellites in real time as they move around the world, you can do it with the Satflare tracker online here.
PLUS: How to see SpaceX’s Starlink satellites over your house tonight
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