A photo that better than any other tells what is happening in our skies

A study by Canada's Western University released on June 17, 2025 contains an analysis of a year's worth of satellite data across national borders, documenting tens of millions of crossings in a photograph with enormous evocative power .

In black and white, the image portrays the trajectories of the satellites as if they were the texture of a frayed fabric, or the web of a silkworm, and conveys the perception of an Earth suffocated by a veil that is becoming increasingly thick, dense and suffocating.

Obviously, this is an optical illusion: astronomical images are created with cameras that “follow” the object to be photographed and are set with very long exposure times.

This method consists of leaving the camera shutter open so that the light can impress the sensor for long enough. The result is that the photograph captures the entire movement as a streak of light and not a single instant. Furthermore, not all satellites cross the same portion of the sky at the same time. Therefore, there is no canvas that envelops our planet, but the image illustrated by the Canadian study is much more evocative than the sparkling swarm displayed by the sites that make available, in real time, the position and number of satellites orbiting above our heads .

This long introduction serves to introduce two crucial themes that characterize the colonization of what we pompously call "space" but which in reality constitutes —still— an external area but still pertaining to the Earth (the Moon, Mars and other celestial bodies are another matter).

Light pollution blinds telescopes

The first concerns the consequences of orbital crowding. The myriad of satellites that surround the Earth are progressively compromising the efficiency of astronomical observation. For years , scientists have been raising alarms — unheard — about the consequences for research of light pollution caused by satellite overcrowding and debris from impacts with other orbital objects.

But this progressive blindness does not only concern the artificial eyes of telescopes , because even human eyes are condemned to the same fate.

This is not a romantic and old-fashioned lament, perhaps inspired by the wandering shepherd of Asia who sees at risk the possibility of addressing his questions to the "moon in the sky, mute and useless", but a serious anthropological question concerning our ancestral relationship with the night and with space, admirably recounted by Isaac Asimov in Nightfall .

Space is already militarized and economically exploited

The second concerns the confession of failure — or hypocrisy — of the “ Outer Space Treaty” of 1967 that “forbade,” but only on paper, the militarization of the sky first and its economic exploitation. With all due respect to legal formalism, neither one nor the other ever stopped, so much so that one might think, with hindsight, that the agreement stipulated under the aegis of the UN did not have “space freedom” at heart but was rather a sort of armed truce between the only two countries — the USA and the USSR — at the time capable of occupying this new strategic domain.

The scenario changes with the entry of two new categories of competitors: the “emerging states” that claim the right to their own space program (the EU is unjustifiably absent, despite its proclamations), and Big Tech such as Starlink (Elon Musk) and Project Kuiper (Jeff Bezos).

While academics debate the “space economy” and governments count on little more than one hand the number of satellites they could launch, Big Tech systematically occupies all the possible “space” (the real one) with its orbiting objects and its technologies. With the insult, to add insult to injury, of not even having to pretend to respect the 1967 Treaty.

The consequences of the strategic blindness of the executives and the EU

The result — whether we like it or not — is that we have to come to terms with these “private governments” unless we start a massive expropriation of technologies and infrastructure.

It is obvious that such an option is not even at the bottom of the list of hypotheses, but it is also clear that by continuing to ignore the factual reality determined by the historical disinterest of the executives towards the high areas of the atmosphere and beyond, we favor the consolidation of economic, technological and strategic balances of which the European Union is not part as a weight, counterweight or fulcrum.

Overcoming the Outer Space Treaty

A first step to (try to) reverse the trend is to overcome the Outer Space Treaty and assert sovereignty over the portions of orbits that pass through the territory of each State, similarly to what happens with airspace. From there we could start to re-establish the balance between public powers and (what should be only) private companies.

Overcoming the Treaty would allow us to re-discuss, without anti-historical limitations or those based on now outdated ideological assumptions, the issue of the exploitation of celestial bodies and their resources. This, however, in the awareness that the only ones who can actually have a say in the matter are those subjects who control the entire supply chain, from the construction of vectors, satellites and spacecraft , to the ownership of launch ranges and fuels.

The others, however skilled they may be at building parts and components, must decide whether to enter fully into the competition by acquiring the right to set conditions at the table of international agreements, or to remain where they are, once again suffering choices made by (and in the interest of) others.