Monday, February 18, 2008

Shooting down a Satellite

The U.S. Navy will attempt to shoot down a faulty spy satellite.
A Delta II rocket lifts off in December, carrying a reconnaissance satellite that failed hours later.
The 5,000-pound satellite malfunctioned immediately after launch in December of 2006. It would likely survive re-entry and disperse potentially deadly fumes over an area the size of two football fields, officials have said.
Pentagon officials have said they believe the satellite would come down on its own in early March.
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said there's nothing the military can do to make the outcome worse.
"If we miss, nothing changes. If we shoot and barely touch it, the satellite is just barely in orbit" and would still burn up somewhat in the atmosphere, Griffin said.
"If we shoot and get a direct hit, that's a clean kill and we're in good shape," he added.

After reading this do you have any worries about the efficiency of the government? Or how they carry out their jobs?
The satellite immediately malfunctioned, that seems a little ridiculous to me. And now they have to spend a large sum of money to make sure that "potentially deadly fumes" dont disperse if the satellite were to survive reentry into the Earth's atmposphere.

4 comments:

Kristina McOmber said...

Well I would just like to say that no matter how experienced you are with engineering, getting things like satellites to work PERFECTLY is pretty damn hard, even with the huge NASA facility on it, because, let's face it, we're all humans and make mistakes. This whole event seems like it is a huge waste of tax payer money - for inefficiency with NASA, for causing environmental damage, and for the military arms we will have to use to protect ourselves from a danger we created. Ironic.... a little. Ok, so I contradicted myself a little here, but the point is that this is just an example of inefficiency and what could have been avoided had we put more money into the Sciences (to prevent mistakes like this) instead of Military.

Anonymous said...

I just heard on NPR that there was a speculation that the government wanted to destroy the satellite because it was afraid that parts would fall down to earth and get into the "wrong hands," i.e. Russia or China, and the parts would reveal advanced, secret technology. Though the government has denied this.

China reprimanded the US, saying that it established a double standard since the US did the same thing to China some time ago when China too shot down its weather satellite which created space debris.

This matter seems really interesting indeed, and just when you though that the space arms race ended with with cold war...

Anonymous said...

I think this whole event is really ridiculous. The government spent large amounts of money to build and launch this satellite. Now they have to use more money to shoot it down and there's a good chance that they miss or barely hit their taget. Right now I think we should be spending more time on economic issues, instead of wasting money on useless satellites. NASA has to take more responsibility and precaution on their products

Anonymous said...

Well, according to wikipedia, the satellite has been up there since Dec. 14, 2006 when it was launched, but it had lost contact with the ground within hours, predicted to be caused by faulty batteries or sorts.

Why they never bothered to take it down then is a puzzle...

But some one recently noticed the deteriorating orbit route, and it was estimated to crash back into earth in a few weeks, that's why they have to eliminate it now.

And it seems, from the wikipedia article that it is not owned by NASA, but by the US National Reconnaissance Office. United Launch Alliance, comprised of Lockheed Martin and Boeing, was the company that they contracted to build the satellite.

Does anyone know if the US National Reconnaissance Office is related to NASA?