This mission (and the science behind it) is a bit out of my area of expertise, but I can address a couple of things: Two words: Micro-meteoroid debris. The ISS is covered in all kinds of MMD panels to prevent stray space dust (sometimes no bigger than a grain of sand) from entering the cabin and giving us all a really really bad day. The Shuttle has a specialized thermal protection system. The wing leading edges (which feel the most heat during re-entry) are covered in reinforced carbon-carbon, the underbelly is covered in a ceramic-coated tile which, I'm told, has a spongy consistency, and the top of the cabin and booster areas are covered in thermal blankets. When Columbia took off, it lost more than a tile. A suitcase-sized piece of falling ice from the External Tank put a large hole in the wing leading edge. The intense heat of re-entry made its way in to the relatively delicate aluminum skin and framework underneath, melting it and causing the eventual disintegration. However, even though Columbia disintegrated during re-entry, there was enough shielding throughout the vehicle that a lot of pieces both large and small were salvaged all over Texas. Basically, the Shuttle isn't designed to burn up, so even a catastrophic failure didn't cause it to burn completely. The Russian Progress vehicle, however, is designed to burn up upon re-entry. When a Progress delivers logistics to the ISS, it gets packed with disposable trash and sent to burn up in the atmosphere. Anything the US adds to the list (including batteries, medical waste, etc.) has to be identified to the Environmental Protection Agency. Different waste falls into different categories, and the EPA wants to know if we plan to throw away anything that has the potential to spread nastiness all over the Earth. If this is truly a DoD spy satellite, I imagine they've made it pretty solid so that it will last as long as possible in the very harsh environment of space. In that case, I suppose it could be shielded enough so that there is a possibility that the tanks survive re-entry. Can the Shuttle go up and bring it down? No. As Cthippo said, there simply isn't enough time. But time is the least of the concerns. The federal budget only gave NASA enough money for a given number of launches. As someone else mentioned, the ISS is still under construction. Even though we get a lot of logistical supplies from the Russian Soyuz and Progress vehicles (and later the European ATV and Japanese HTV), the Shuttle is the only thing we have to lift the ISS modules. We had a hard enough time freeing one up for the Hubble mission. Also, orbital mechanics is most likely against us as well. We would have to launch at just the right time in order to meet up with the satellite (the so-called "launch window" - we have them for the ISS, as well). This is why we can't fly a one-man vehicle from the ISS, either. First, just about any spacewalk includes a camp out in the airlock the day before so that the astronaut becomes acclimated to the pressure inside the spacesuit. Then, it takes at least one other person to help the astronaut get into and out of the spacesuit. Second, physics and orbital mechanics tells us that once we get into an orbit, to significantly change your orbit and fly somewhere else would take almost as much energy as it took you to get into orbit in the first place. We've come a long way in space flight, but we still have a long, long way to go. So we come back to the original problem. Do we let the wayward satellite decay and burn up, or shoot it down? I've heard some counter-arguments that suggest the tanks would disintegrate and that any nasty fuel would burn up. I've also heard that this is more to do with protecting government secrets that deadly gases. Previous events have shown us that hardware can survive atmospheric re-entry. The US government doesn't want the satellite landing in Osama's backyard. A couple month's ago, a Chinese satellite exploded, but the debris field ultimately posed no threat to other satellites or vehicles. So it has been shown that things can be blown up safely. It's a tricky problem, and I, for one, am thankful that I don't have enough letters after my name to have to solve it. -monkey
Looks like the US are planning to shoot the satellite down over Hawaii during the lunar eclipse Wednesday night. Story on Slashdot here.
Could be - some defense analysts have theorised that that sat in question may be a 'game changing' piece of equipment, namely some sort of low power radar observation bird. Optical spy sats suffer from 'the dinking straw effect', i.e they don't have a very wide field of view. Radar overcomes this, but it's very power hungry, and previous attempts to run them involved radioisotop generators. The theory is that this is a radar based sat that was to be used to track shipping (and possibly subs), but using some new form of low power equipment - low enough to be powered by Solar cells. If it is, the NRO probably dont want that sort of tech falling into the "wrong hands". And of course, there is all that nice missle defense data it'll generate
Oops - forgot to add a link: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/0...r_russia_china_rhubarb_submarine_speculation/
Direct hit!!!!!!! cost of this little mission: missile = $70 million satellite = +$1 billion total = holy crap
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7256741.stm Video on the right. Fairly surprised that they managed to hit it really.
Are you guys surprised that a missile that cost $70 million actually did what it was supposed to do? I think it's a shame that a $1billion+ satellite doesn't last for like 100 years or so. +1 holy crap, i reckon i could make a better missile for like $7 million, so the us can buy one from me for say $10 million - what a steal! Don't keep me waiting bush, this is a limited offer, just think of what you can do with the $60 million dollars in savings!!! $3million invested is enough to reitre on.. but wait, that's alot of tax, even if i put it in super.... ok, after much deliberation, the price is now $15 million, which is still a completely awesome deal, where are you gonna find a bargain like this bush?
Oh, i didn't know that missile wasn't designed to blow the crap out of stuff. Gimmie $10 million and ill give ya a nice missile paypal is ok.