SpaceX Starlink Chain

Tonight was my first sighting of a chain of SpaceX Starlink satellites. At 9:00 PM a series of fast moving dots appeared in the Northwest sky over Melbourne. The dots were travelling faster than airplanes, but much slower than “shooting stars”.

SpaceX Starlink satellites; photo by Andrew

SpaceX currently has over 400 Starlink satellites in orbit with plans to add thousands more over the next few years. The end goal is to provide world wide, low latency Internet connections. SpaceX launches Starlink satellites in groups of up to 60 at a time. The satellites are deployed all at once and slowly separate as they move to their final individual orbits. They are sometimes visible before dawn or after dusk. There are several web pages available with location-based information about when they may be visible, for example: SpaceX Starlink Satellites Tracker

For more information, check out the SpaceX Starlink site.