Impact of Satellite Trails on H.E.S.S. Astronomical Observations
Thomas Lang, Samuel T. Spencer, Alison M.W. Mitchell

TL;DR
This study investigates how the increasing number of reflective satellites impacts ground-based gamma-ray astronomy, specifically analyzing data from H.E.S.S. telescopes to assess potential observational interference and data quality issues.
Contribution
It provides the first empirical assessment of satellite trail effects on IACT data, quantifying their impact on event classification and data quality.
Findings
Satellite trails can cause false triggers in H.E.S.S. data.
The affected data fraction is currently minimal but may grow.
Trails could impact future telescopes with advanced analysis techniques.
Abstract
The number of satellites launched into Earth's orbit has almost tripled in the last three years due to the increasing commercialisation of space. Multiple satellite constellations, consisting of over 400,000 individual satellites, have either been partially launched or are proposed for launch in the near future. Many of these satellites are highly reflective, resulting in a high optical brightness that affects ground-based astronomical observations. Despite this caveat, the potential effect of these satellites on gamma-ray-observing Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes (IACTs) has largely been assumed to be negligible due to their nanosecond-scale integration times. However, this assumption has not been verified to date. As IACTs are sensitive to optical wavelength light, we aim to identify satellite trails in data taken by the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) IACT array.…
Peer Reviews
No public reviews on file for this paper yet. If you reviewed it on a platform where reviews are public (OpenReview, ICLR, NeurIPS, ICML), you can paste yours below so the community can read it here.
Videos
No videos yet. Explain this paper in a talk, walkthrough, or lecture? Add one.
Taxonomy
TopicsGamma-ray bursts and supernovae · Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena · Atmospheric Ozone and Climate
