2024/01/03 by Anthony Mallama, Mallama, Anthony, Richard E. Cole +9
Physics and Astronomy · #Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Adaptive optics and wavefront sensing
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2401.01546
The illumination phase functions for Starlink Mini satellites are determined for times of twilight and darkness. Those functions are then evaluated to give apparent magnitudes over a grid of points across the sky and over a range of solar angles below the horizon. Sky maps and a table of satellite magnitude distributions are presented. The largest areas of sky with satellites brighter than magnitudes 6 and 7 both occur during twilight. Brightness surges, known as flares, are also characterized.