The Impact of Space Debris on Optical Astronomy

Abstract

Photometric observations of space debris objects brighter than magnitudes 6.0, 7.0 and 8.0 are characterized. Those magnitudes pertain to different levels of interference with astronomy as defined by the International Astronomical Union. The densities of debris objects per square degree of sky and brighter than the magnitudes listed above are only 6, 13 and 24 parts per million, respectively. Furthermore, only about 1.4%, 2.5% and 3.8% of the 12,173 debris objects cataloged by NORAD exceed those magnitudes for even a small fraction of the time. So, debris trails have a minor impact on astronomical images and visual sightings are few. Characteristics of debris resulting from selected spacecraft collisions and rocket explosions are also quantified. This study is based on 13 million observations recorded by the MMT9 observatory.