Orbital skeet shooting

[isomeme]

An errant spy satellite is due to re-enter soon; it's big enough and has components tough enough for parts of it to hit the surface, and contains toxic chemicals. So apparently the Navy is planning to blow it up with a missile.  I find it amusing that the story's headline says that the satellite will be "shot down".  No, it's already coming down,

Comments

pieces for sale

[sesa777]

I wonder how long it will be before some of the satellite pieces end up for auction on Ebay?:)

[rodneyorpheus]

AFAIK they aren't blowing it up to make it safer for us - they want to make it safer for *them* since there's classified data onboard that thing; and they're worried that someone else could snatch it on the way down...

[isomeme]

That is depressingly more plausible. Catching it on the way down would be a bit of a challenge, I think, but even scooping up post-impact debris would probably give The Bad Guys (whoever they are at the moment) useful information.

[rodneyorpheus]

Apparently the confusion arises because some US spokesman was quoted on the BBC yesterday as saying it was because it was full of sensitive data. However this mysteriously became "because it's full of hydrazine and might hurt somebody" some hours later on the US news.

Surely if it was full of inflammable fuel it would be MORE likely to blow it by itself in re-entry?

You take your pick, I know which one mine is.

[fraterseraphino]

Huh.

I was about to write about the experiments done by launching an anti-satellite weapon from an F-15 which flies right to the edge of the atmosphere--but apparently, they plan to destroy the satellite by launching an SM-3 using an ASAT payload from USS Lake Erie sometime in the next few weeks.

But I guess it makes sense: as long as the SM-3 can reach the edge of the atmosphere, an ASAT package can take over.

What I find really funny about this is that according to all the news reports the only ASAT tests we had carried out were all launched from a high-flying F-15--and that program was cancelled in the late 80's, leaving us without any anti-satellite weapons. Now, all of a sudden, we're shooting down a spy satellite at an orbit much higher than any tests done by either Russia or China--but oh, this is just a rushed and jury-rigged one-time program?

*cough* *cough* Nothing to see here, I suppose.