http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/space/02/14/spy.satellite.ap/index.html

OMFG IF CHINA CAN SHOOT ONE DOWN SO CAN WE!!

This is going to open a pandora's box that will muck up space beyond usability. When China blasted one of their own satellites a year ago, it created hundreds of thousands of chunks of space debris that could damage or destroy any number of satellites (or worse, human occupied craft) for many decades to come.

2/14/2008 1:03:45 PM

i guess theres no reliable way to...send it into the sun or something?

2/14/2008 1:04:58 PM

the chinese have no soul

2/14/2008 1:05:32 PM

just let the thing burn up in the atmosphere. even if a few chunks get through, no big deal.

2/14/2008 1:07:24 PM

dont satellites have a pretty decent heat shield or something so that they can exit the atmosphere during initial launch?

2/14/2008 1:08:19 PM

no. heat shields are for reentry.

2/14/2008 1:13:22 PM

We shot down a satellite in the mid-80s. We've had the technology for a long time.

The issue is that the thing is a complex spy satellite that was launched in 2006. I'm sure that they just don't want someone to get a peek at our goodies as about 2500 pounds of it is going to survive reentry.

2/14/2008 1:17:27 PM

^^i figure they'd be for exit and re-entry

but either way my point was, why wouldnt the heat shields prevent the atmosphere from burning it up?

[Edited on February 14, 2008 at 1:19 PM. Reason : ^^]

2/14/2008 1:19:24 PM

Satellites don't have heat sheilds. When they reach the end of their effectiveness the best options is to have it burn up. Generally they'll use its thrusters to put into a decaying orbit that will dump it in the Pacific somewhere so that debris doesn't pose a threat to anyone. Heat sheilds are basically reserved for manned missions where the whole point is to bring something back intact.

The problem with this one is that they can't control it and as such, have no control over where it lands.

2/14/2008 1:26:05 PM

they should make satellites biodegradable

2/14/2008 1:29:45 PM

as much as i love to criticize US foreign policy i thought part of the justification was to prevent some of the debris from potentially making it to the surface since it contains some toxic chemicals. I really see no problem anyway either if our military wants to test its capabilities to shoot down one of our satellites. In the case of a justified war with a major power this would be useful.

2/14/2008 1:31:21 PM

What will be interesting is if they attempt to use the AN/SPY 1 - Bravo to track it and an SM-III to shoot it down.

I understand that we have been able to shoot down satellites for a long time, but this would be a good opportunity to test whether a sea based, moving platform can take out satellites easily. I know the capability is there for our Aegis class ships.

[Edited on February 14, 2008 at 1:40 PM. Reason : /]

2/14/2008 1:36:50 PM

As usual I eventually went to wikipedia. I didn't realize that ASAT technology was a micro-arms race of the Cold War.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon

2/14/2008 1:37:12 PM

Quote :

"As usual I eventually went to wikipedia. I didn't realize that ASAT technology was a micro-arms race of the Cold War. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon"

You never heard of Star Wars?

2/14/2008 1:40:07 PM

Missile defense and anti-satellite technology are two different things.

2/14/2008 2:00:01 PM

I thought Star Wars was for blowing ICBMs out of the sky, not knocking satellites out of orbit.

Quote :

"This is going to open a pandora's box that will muck up space beyond usability."

It's already open. We may have managed to nearly close it at the end of the Cold War, but given that the vulnerability of our satellite networks is the weak link in not just our military but also other emerging military nations, the reopening by another nation was inevitable. The Chinese have reopened it in their pursuit of asymmetric strategies to battle the United States, and now we're going to respond.

If I remember too, this type of weapon wasn't covered in the existing space militarization treaties we signed.

2/14/2008 2:08:55 PM

This satellite is in a rapidly decaying orbit. Depending on how the missile hits it, the majority of the debris could EASILY burn up in the atmosphere. This is vastly different from the Chinese hit their own satellite in a stable and much higher orbit.

2/14/2008 3:50:14 PM

Quote :

" China is responsible for 42 percent of all satellite debris in orbit as of January 1, most of it from that Fengyun-C meteorological satellite. NASA has called it the worst satellite breakup in history"

2/14/2008 5:50:12 PM

And?

That was at 500 miles up, this is at 150 miles and decaying rapidly

2/14/2008 5:54:45 PM

once i got to thinking about this, i assumed that all that they were saying about it was bullshit. they want to show the chinese how advanced our systems are for shooting down satellites to counter what they have accomplished in the field recently.

2/14/2008 6:43:17 PM

This satellite was launched in 2006. Why sacrifice a brand new satellite when you could just set an older defunct satellite into a decaying orbit? This thing is valuable and has some good technology on it. We dun fucked up with it. So we're going to blast the fucker out of the sky so no one has a chance of recovering it.

[Edited on February 14, 2008 at 7:34 PM. Reason : a]

2/14/2008 7:33:18 PM

SDI was about a lot of things.

Satellite destruction was one of them.

Quote :

"The issue is that the thing is a complex spy satellite that was launched in 2006. I'm sure that they just don't want someone to get a peek at our goodies as about 2500 pounds of it is going to survive reentry."

Mr. Joshua gets the secret square!

Conjures up memories of that old spy place incident...

---

Quote :

"China is responsible for 42 percent of all satellite debris in orbit as of January 1, most of it from that Fengyun-C meteorological satellite. NASA has called it the worst satellite breakup in history"

[Edited on February 14, 2008 at 7:43 PM. Reason : ...]

2/14/2008 7:42:35 PM

Quote :

"Known orbit planes of Fengyun-1C debris one month after its disintegration by the chinese ASAT"

2/14/2008 8:22:44 PM

Quote :

" That was at 500 miles up, this is at 150 miles and decaying rapidly"

It's still a horribly irresponsible thing to do. Sure the Chinese test was like busting open a pinata full of nails in the middle of a highway and giggling like a special-needs kid who just found a jellybean... but there is still potential for the US test to do billions of dollars of damage to satellites or at the least disrupt launch tables for a sizable portion of the globe.

The test isn't that useful anyways. Hitting a satellite whose orbit you know and control isn't exactly rocket science... well actually it is, but it's pretty simple as far as rocket science goes.

2/14/2008 8:30:24 PM

pff yeah

that's why only 3 nations have ever developed the technology to do such a thing


shits a cake walk.

by the way to dont control the orbit of the satellite. thats why they're shooting it down

[Edited on February 14, 2008 at 8:57 PM. Reason : ,]

2/14/2008 8:56:40 PM

^^ THIS ISN'T A TEST

2/14/2008 8:59:23 PM

Ah alright, it's the last alternative. Watch out for that capslock key though- one errant pinky stroke and people will think you're some kind of dick.

2/14/2008 9:02:50 PM

Quote :

"I understand that we have been able to shoot down satellites for a long time, but this would be a good opportunity to test whether a sea based, moving platform can take out satellites easily. I know the capability is there for our Aegis class ships."

They\'ve done this about 10 times already in tests with missiles. The satellite problem is not too different
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aegis_Ballistic_Missile_Defense_System

2/14/2008 9:10:53 PM

Quote :

"This satellite was launched in 2006. Why sacrifice a brand new satellite when you could just set an older defunct satellite into a decaying orbit? This thing is valuable and has some good technology on it. We dun fucked up with it. So we're going to blast the fucker out of the sky so no one has a chance of recovering it."

i have no doubt that this satellite was fucked up. this is just a highly public demonstration of capability.

2/14/2008 9:38:09 PM

And the plot thickens:

1.

Quote :

"It is not known where the satellite will hit. But officials familiar with the situation say about half of the 5,000-pound spacecraft is expected to survive its blazing descent through the atmosphere and will scatter debris -- some of it potentially hazardous -- over several hundred miles. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter."

2.

Quote :

"Known by its military designation US 193, the satellite was launched in December 2006. It lost power and its central computer failed almost immediately afterward, leaving it uncontrollable. It carried a sophisticated and secret imaging sensor."

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=4291091

3.

Quote :

"There might also be unstated military aims, some outside the administration suggested. Similar spacecraft re-enter the atmosphere regularly and break up into pieces, said Ivan Oelrich, vice president for strategic security programs at the Federation of American Scientists. He said, 'One could be forgiven for asking if this is just an excuse to test an anti-satellite weapon.'"

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h7aoM2ii3QVBCAV8m2HtJSuPxPNwD8UQDQT00

2/14/2008 11:52:54 PM

Quote :

"OMFG IF CHINA CAN SHOOT ONE DOWN SO CAN WE!! This is going to open a pandora's box that will muck up space beyond usability. When China blasted one of their own satellites a year ago, it created hundreds of thousands of chunks of space debris that could damage or destroy any number of satellites (or worse, human occupied craft) for many decades to come."

WOW EXCELLENT ANALYSIS!!! Thanks for your insight!

2/15/2008 12:43:08 AM

starwars!

2/15/2008 9:21:01 AM

Quote :

"What will be interesting is if they attempt to use the AN/SPY 1 - Bravo to track it and an SM-III to shoot it down. I understand that we have been able to shoot down satellites for a long time, but this would be a good opportunity to test whether a sea based, moving platform can take out satellites easily. I know the capability is there for our Aegis class ships. "

I am right every once in a while. But I guess anyone could have guessed this that knows anything about National Defense.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/space/02/14/spy.satellite/index.html

Quote :

"There will be three Navy ships involved in the operation. The USS Lake Erie, an Aegis cruiser, will fire the missile, while trajectory information comes from a second ship. The third ship will be used as a backup, U.S. Navy officials said. "

[Edited on February 15, 2008 at 9:37 AM. Reason : either way this is a really cool capability]

2/15/2008 9:36:47 AM

Quote :

"WOW EXCELLENT ANALYSIS!!! Thanks for your insight!"

who the fuck are you?

2/15/2008 10:19:31 AM

The hardest part is getting the missile directly in the exhaust port, which by all accounts is no larger than a womp rat.

2/15/2008 12:12:35 PM

china has been lasering our satellites for years now,

just contract it out to them

they own everything else of ours...just put it on our tab

2/15/2008 12:23:09 PM

U.S. vows to pay for damage caused by satellite

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080215/sc_nm/usa_satellite_damage_dc

2/15/2008 1:32:15 PM

I'm all for conspiracy theories involving the military-industrial complex, but i think this is legit.

it is rapidly decaying, will crash into the earth, nobody knows where, and contains about 1000 gallons of a highly toxic fuel that would be released as a highly poisonous gas. theres a significant chance for loss of life.

if we blast it before it descends into the atmosphere, we at least have a good chance of letting the shit burn up in the atmosphere.




[Edited on February 17, 2008 at 3:57 AM. Reason : ]

2/17/2008 3:52:14 AM

^ plus its a good test for us...bout time we got some practice doing some cool shit...china got to test theirs why dont we get to test ours...

2/17/2008 3:55:27 AM

When are they going to shoot it down?

2/17/2008 3:56:38 AM

^^ We've been able to knock out satellites for st least 20+ years now. We've tested it many times.

2/17/2008 3:58:22 AM

Quote :

"I'm all for conspiracy theories involving the military-industrial complex, but i think this is legit. it is rapidly decaying, will crash into the earth, nobody knows where, and contains about 1000 gallons of a highly toxic fuel that would be released as a highly poisonous gas. theres a significant chance for loss of life. if we blast it before it descends into the atmosphere, we at least have a good chance of letting the shit burn up in the atmosphere."

yeah, satellites get screwed up and reenter the atmosphere all the time.

2/17/2008 10:53:02 AM

Smath, quit trolling, you're better than this.

2/17/2008 12:47:21 PM

We probably don't want to risk the satellite crashing somewhere and getting recovered by other nations.

2/17/2008 1:21:58 PM

may try on thursday

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/space/02/18/satellite.intercept/index.html

2/18/2008 6:45:03 PM

what if we mess up is what i'm wondering....that would make us look so freaking bad...

2/18/2008 6:47:13 PM

one more step for china to kill us all

2/18/2008 9:24:21 PM

Quote :

"Smath, quit trolling, you're better than this."

?

2/18/2008 11:33:19 PM

*pew pew pew*

2/19/2008 3:21:24 AM

setemup

2/19/2008 9:04:03 AM