Posted on 02/14/2008 9:07:45 AM PST by montag813
WASHINGTON - U.S. officials say the Pentagon is planning to shoot down a broken spy satellite expected to hit the Earth in early March.
This is the U.S. military will use a missile to destroy a satellite in space, NBC News reports.
The spy satellite has lost all power and is expected to crash back on earth in early March, spreading debris and potentially hazardous fuel over several hundred miles.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
IM transcript:
PutinKremlin3: d00d! u shot my sat!
WThePrez: p0wn3d! LOL
PutinKremlin3:u r teh suq
WThePrez: all ur sats are belong to us
Everything on Earth orbit will come down sooner or later.
I don't know how to tell you this, but vacuum cleaners don't work in a vacuum.
Nope. Venezuelans perhaps.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity, because the information released was Sensitive Compartmented Information.
Since it’s our money paying for this, we need good, cool video.
I don't think a vacuum cleaner would work in a vacuum. But I was just thinking about that very thing -- how about several satellites sweeping around the earth with big aerogel panels on the front? That should capture the smaller particles.
xlnt
cool!
Except that in Red Storm Rising, it was a modified air intercept missile fired from a fighter, an F18, IIRC.
It isnt the fuel, its the payload
Ha! I bet they use a spark in the center fuel tank...
- retrieved the satellite via a Shuttle mission
- placed rocket motors to the satellites to force either a controlled re-entry or send it to the sun.
- shoot it down upon re-entry
How do these satellites normally return to Earth?
I would think -- and I admit I'm no physicist -- that it would depend in what direction it's hit. If it's hit directly from below, that might blow the debris back upward. But if it's hit obliquely from behind -- ideally behind and above, it they can target the missile that precisely -- then it would drive the debris downward, where it will burn up in the atmosphere.
Only of we shoot it down while it's still in orbit. If we fire when it's starting to bite into the atmosphere, all he pieces will deorbit too. Instead of one large object coming in, we get a meteor shower.
LOL
“Didn’t we get all perturbed because the Chinese shot a sattelite in orbit and created a lot of space junk?”
Yeah, but this is different.
It’s one of our spy satellites, and we don’t want it to crash in an “unfriendly” country such as russia or china where they’ll be able to glean info from it.
We also don’t want it to crash in the middle east since it carries radioactive materials that could end up being used in a dirty bomb.
And because of the radioactive materials onboard, we don’t exactly want it crashing in our backyard or crashing into someone’s house either.
The best option would be to blow it up.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.