Astronomy vs. the Billionaire Space Race - Dr Samantha Lawler, University of Regina
Schedule
Fri, 13 Feb, 2026 at 08:00 am
UTC+13:00Location
RHLT1, Victoria University of Wellington Pipitea Campus | Wellington, WG
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RASNZ, WAS and the University of Victoria Wellington are co-hosting this year's Beatrice Hill-Tinsley Lecture.Time: 6:00 pm, Date: Friday 13 May 2026
Venue: RHLT1, Victoria University Pipitea Campus
Available online via Zoom https://vuw.zoom.us/j/97988322365 if you can’t make it in person, but we strongly encourage in-person attendance for the best experience!
In February 2024, hundreds of pounds of potentially lethal debris from a SpaceX Crew Dragon trunk from a private astronaut mission fell on farmland near Regina, Saskatchewan. Later in the year, a piece of a SpaceX Starlink satellite was found in a lentil field in another part of the province. In September 2025, one of the handful of Starlink satellites reentering every week was witnessed burning up across the entire western half of Canada, with the reentry ending over Saskatchewan.
Dr. Samantha Lawler of the University of Regina has been studying the proliferation of satellites in orbit over the past few years, and has been stunned to learn how often space debris falls so close to her home. Come learn why Saskatchewan is the best place in the world to find space debris, and what happens when you find space debris on your farm and silent SpaceX employees show up in a rented truck to be greeted by an astronomer and a dozen of Saskatchewan's finest local journalists. The billionaire space race is well underway, and this has important implications for international law, the continued operation of satellites in Low Earth Orbit, atmospheric pollution, and the future of astronomy.
Samantha Lawler is a professor of astronomy at the University of Regina in Saskatchewan, Canada. She completed degrees at the California Institute of Technology, Wesleyan University, and the University of British Columbia, followed by postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Victoria (Canada) and NRC-Herzberg Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Centre. Her discoveries in the Kuiper Belt and predictions for satellite pollution have been featured by BBC, CBC, CNN, NPR, BBC, Scientific American, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Wired Magazine, Nature, and many other international news outlets. She lives on a farm outside Regina and deeply appreciates the beautiful prairie skies.
#nziauastronomy NZ IAU Astronomy Outreach
IAU Office for Astronomy Outreach
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Where is it happening?
RHLT1, Victoria University of Wellington Pipitea Campus, 6 Kelburn Pde, Kelburn, Wellington 6012, New Zealand, WellingtonEvent Location & Nearby Stays:
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