Only a few Hubble observations are affected for now, but the problem is going to get much, much worse.
Astronomers are once again worried about the effect that satellites like those used by SpaceX for its Starlink service will have on scientific research. A recent study looked at the effect that such satellites were having on observations from the Hubble Space Telescope and found that observations were already being impacted by the number of satellites nearby.
When these satellites pass in front of telescopes like Hubble, they can leave bright streaks across the images due to reflected sunlight which makes the data scientifically useless. The researchers found that just a small fraction of Hubble images are currently affected, at less than 1%, but they did show a variety of images with ruinous streaks like the one above. And the biggest concern is for the future, with more and more satellites set to launch in the next few years.
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