ALERT>> Spy satellite Nuke Threat? National Reconnaissance Office EXPOSED!!!

[StemCell]

Russia: U.S. satellite shot a weapons test
The Associated Press --

Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Gen. James Cartwright, center, flanked by Deputy National Security Adviser James Jeffrey, left, and NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, gestures during a news conference at the Pentagon, Thursday, Feb. 14, 2008, to discuss the use of a Navy missile to attempt to destroy a broken U.S. spy satellite.
Heesoon Yim
Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Gen. James Cartwright, center, flanked by Deputy National Security Adviser James Jeffrey, left, and NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, gestures during a news conference at the Pentagon, Thursday, Feb. 14, 2008, to discuss the use of a Navy missile to attempt to destroy a broken U.S. spy satellite.

MOSCOW --
Russia said Saturday that U.S. military plans to shoot down a damaged spy satellite may be a veiled test of America's missile defense system.

The Pentagon failed to provide "enough arguments" to back its plan to smash the satellite next week with a missile, Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement.

"There is an impression that the United States is trying to use the accident with its satellite to test its national anti-missile defense system's capability to destroy other countries' satellites," the ministry said.

The Bush administration says the operation is not a test of a program to kill other nations' orbiting communications and intelligence capabilities. U.S. diplomats around the world have been instructed to inform governments that it is meant to protect people from 1,000 pounds of toxic fuel on the bus-sized satellite hurtling toward Earth.

The diplomats were told to distinguish the upcoming attempt from last year's test by China of a missile specifically designed to take out satellites, which was criticized by the United States and other countries.

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.

Left alone, the satellite would likely hit Earth during the first week of March. About half of the 5,000-pound spacecraft would probably survive its blazing descent through the atmosphere and would scatter debris over several hundred miles.

Military and administration officials said the satellite is carrying fuel called hydrazine that could injure or kill people who are near it when it hits the ground.

The operation to shoot down the dead satellite could happen as soon as next week.

[StemCell]

Could this be whats behind the shoot down?

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran launched a rocket on Monday designed to send its first homemade research satellite into orbit in the next year, state television said, a move likely to add to Western concerns about Tehran's nuclear plans.

The ability to put satellites into orbit could indicate an advance in the Islamic Republic's missile technology, though official media gave few details.

State television reported the rocket had blasted off but did not show the launch. It had earlier broadcast footage of a rocket on a launch pad in desert terrain.

It said the satellite, called Omid (Hope), would be launched in the next Iranian year, which ends in March 2009.

"We need to have an active and influential presence in space," President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in a televised ceremony before the launch.

"Iran took its first step (to establish a presence in space) very strongly, precisely and wisely," he said. "Building and launching a satellite is a very important achievement."

Ahmadinejad and other senior Iranian officials were shown in an auditorium but state television did not say where it was.

Iran often announces advances in its missile technology. In November it said it had built a new missile with a range of 2,000 km (1,250 miles), adding to the scope of its conventional arsenal.

Western experts say Iran rarely gives enough details to determine how significant its technology advances are. They say much Iranian technology is based on modifications to equipment supplied by others, including China and North Korea.

Western capitals fear Iran is trying to master technology so it can build nuclear weapons. Iran insists its plans are peaceful and that it wants to generate electricity from nuclear power plants.

[menace]

Iran launched its first locally made rocket into space simultaneously with the inauguration of its first domestic satellite complex. The rocket, dubbed Kavoshgar (explorer), was sent off to space from the launch pad on an official order from the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2C4xSwcKxWs&feature=related

[StemCell]

Satellite Spotters Glimpse Secrets, and Tell Them

By JOHN SCHWARTZ
Published: February 5, 2008

When the government announced last month that a top-secret spy satellite would, in the next few months, come falling out of the sky, American officials said there was little risk to people because satellites fall out of orbit fairly frequently and much of the planet is covered by oceans.
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But they said precious little about the satellite itself.

Such information came instead from Ted Molczan, a hobbyist who tracks satellites from his apartment balcony in Toronto, and fellow satellite spotters around the world. They have grudgingly become accustomed to being seen as “propeller-headed geeks” who “poke their finger in the eye” of the government’s satellite spymasters, Mr. Molczan said, taking no offense. “I have a sense of humor,” he said.

Mr. Molczan, a private energy conservation consultant, is the best known of the satellite spotters who, needing little more than a pair of binoculars, a stop watch and star charts, uncover some of the deepest of the government’s expensive secrets and share them on the Internet.

Thousands of people form the spotter community. Many look for historical relics of the early space age, working from publicly available orbital information. Others watch for phenomena like the distinctive flare of sunlight glinting off bright solar panels of some telephone satellites. Still others are drawn to the secretive world of spy satellites, with about a dozen hobbyists who do most of the observing, Mr. Molczan said.

In the case of the mysterious satellite that is about to plunge back to earth, Mr. Molczan had an early sense of which one it was, identifying it as USA-193, which gave out shortly after reaching space in December 2006. It is said to have been built by the Lockheed Martin Corporation and operated by the secretive National Reconnaissance Office.

Another hobbyist, John Locker of Britain, posted photos of the satellite on a Web site, galaxypix.com.

John E. Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a private group in Alexandria, Va., that tracks military and space activities, said the hobbyists exemplified fundamental principles of openness and of the power of technology to change the game.

“It has been an important demystification of these things,” Mr. Pike said, “because I think there is a tendency on the part of these agencies just to try to pretend that they don’t exist, and that nothing can be known about them.”

But the spotters are also pursuing a thoroughly unusual pastime, one that calls for long hours outside, freezing in the winter and sweating in the summer, straining to see a moving light in the sky and hoping that a slip of the finger on the stopwatch does not delete an entire night’s work. And for the adept, there is math. Lots of math.

“It’s somewhat time consuming and tedious,” Mr. Molczan said, acknowledging that the precise and methodical activities might seem, to the uninitiated, “a close approximation to work.”

When a new spy satellite is launched, the hobbyists will collaborate on sightings around the world to determine its orbit, and even guess at its function, sharing their information through the e-mail network SeeSat-L, which can be found via the Web site satobs.org.

From his 23rd-floor balcony, or the roof of his 32-floor building, Mr. Molzcan will peer through his binoculars at a point in the sky he expects the satellite to cross, which he locates with star charts. When the moving dot appears, he determines its direction and the distance it travels across the patch of sky over time, which he can use to calculate its speed.

Mr. Molzcan declined a request to visit him in Toronto and to be photographed for this article, saying: “No offense intended, but this is beginning to sound like more of a human interest story than one about the substance of the hobby. My preference is for the latter. Also, I prefer not to have photos of myself published.”

Mr. Locker, who favors a telescope for his camerawork, said that people like him and Mr. Molczan were not, as he put it, “nerdy buffs who lie on our backs and look into the sky and try to undermine governments.” Spotting, he said, is simply a hobby.

“There are people who look at train timetables and go watch trains,” he said. People are drawn to what interests them, he said, and “it’s what draws people to any hobby.”

While recent news coverage has focused on the current satellite’s threat to people when it falls from above, that threat is, statistically, very small. Even when the space shuttle Columbia broke up over Texas five years ago and rained debris over two states, no one on the ground was injured.

Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council, noted that 328 satellites had come down in the past five years without injury to anyone. While Mr. Johndroe declined to divulge much about the current satellite aside from the fact that it carries no nuclear material, he said that the government would take responsibility in the remote chance of damage or injury.

The government’s relationship with the hobbyists is not a comfortable one. Spokesmen for the National Reconnaissance Office have stated that they would prefer the hobbyists not publish their information, and suggest that foreign countries try to hide their activities when they know an eye in the sky will be passing overhead.

The satellite spotters acknowledge that this may be so, though they doubt that such tactics are effective. Mr. Molczan said he believed that the hobbyists hurt no one but that “you can’t say with absolute certainty what effect you’re having.”

Mr. Pike said the officials who complained about the hobbyists “don’t like it, but they’ve got to lump it.” Despite the many clever ways that the spy agencies try to minimize the likelihood that their satellites will be spotted, he said, they will be. And that, he said, is a valuable warning: a world with so many eyes on the skies renders deep secrets shallow.

“If Ted can track all these satellites,” Mr. Pike said, “so can the Chinese.”

[Dig]

I think this is as good a time as any to give a public acknowledgement to Brendan who has only been at this forum for 60 days.  He asked for a new room called "space weapons" and I was like...

"yeah whatever dude, fricking space weapons, like that is ever going to be a problem."

Well, I dare any of you to find another forum with so much clear, rational, and sourced information about this impending disaster.

He has over 200 seperate threads with all of the details of this path to total armageddon.

Space is owned by NWO and they are planning some really extraordinary false flag "shock and awe" campaigns in the future.

If you have not examined the data in that room yet, you now have no excuse...get in there!

Thank you Brendan for your incredible service to this forum!

[Dig]

Watch the spy satellite before it's shot down
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/atlanta/stories/2008/02/16/satellitecrash_0217.html
By JEFFRY SCOTT The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Published on: 02/16/08

Want to spy on a spy in the sky before it gets shot down by the U.S. government? Between 6:26 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday, the ill-fated spy satellite USA 193 should be visible to Atlantans if skies are clear and you use binoculars to scan the south/southeast horizon. The satellite can be tracked for about four minutes as it moves to the east/northeast. That is the prediction posted Saturday on the Web site www.heavens-above.com of Ted Molczan, a Toronto-based satellite tracker. Molczan and a network of sky watchers around the globe monitor about 140 classified U.S. satellites and other man-made craft orbiting earth. Just so you'll know roughly what to look for, there's a blurry photo of the satellite posted on the Web site of Galaxy Picture Library, www.galaxypix.com The photo was taken last month by amateur English astronomer John Locker with an $80 Web cam and telescope while standing in the back yard of his home in Wirral, in northwest England, according to the publication skymania.com. Those elements just add more intrigue to the life and death story of a satellite that became news Thursday when national security officials said they planned to shoot it down, sometime after next Wednesday, with anti-ballistic missiles fired from a Navy cruiser in the Pacific Ocean. The government reported last month that the bus-sized satellite was unresponsive and out of control. The reason for shooting it down, Pentagon officials said Thursday, was that it is carrying 1,000 pounds of toxic hydrazine, a fuel.

If the container holding the hydrazine stayed intact during fiery reentry to earth it could leak and cause potentially fatal injury over an area the size of two football fields, said Deputy National Security Advisor James Jeffrey. Officials haven't revealed much about the satellite except to acknowledge it is a spy satellite and that "we cannot predict the entry impact area." The most famous incident of an American satellite crashing to earth was Skylab, which plunged into the Indian Ocean on July 11, 1979, after six years in orbit. Nobody was hit or hurt. But debris also fell on Western Australia, and one small town, Shire of Esperance, reportedly fined the United States $400 for littering. Molczan's Web site offers more, unconfirmed, information about the spy bird. According to its profile of "Decaying Spy Satellite USA 193," the satellite was launched in secret atop a Delta II rocket on Dec. 14, 2006, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

"The exact design and purpose of USA 193 are, of course, closely guarded secrets," reads the profile. "But specialists believe it is probably a high resolution radar satellite which was intended to produce images for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO)." A graph on the web site shows how badly the satellite's orbit has decayed since March 2007, when it orbited about 217 miles above earth. By last week, the satellite was losing altitude about a rate of almost one mile a day. Molczan has predicted that if the satellite isn't shot down, it would probably crash around March 18, when its orbital altitude will have fallen to about 62 miles. The response to the government's stated reason for shooting down the satellite has been mixed. None dispute that Hydrazine is dangerous to humans who come in contact with it. There are, however, acceptable levels of exposure to the chemical, which also is used in manufacturing such things as carpeting. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration limits the amount of hydrazine in workplace air to 0.1 parts per million during an 8-hour day, and warns of the potential of absorbing the chemical through the skin.

The Food and Drug Administration warns against letting hydrazine come into contact with food, and restricts the amount that can be released into the environment during burying or by disposal in landfills. Many skeptics theorize the real reason the government is going to great expense to shoot down USA 193 is because it fears the satellite will crash in the wrong place — Russia or China — where secrets could be mined from the charred remains. Michael Krepon, co-founder of the Washington, D.C.-based Henry L. Stimson Center, an arms-control advocacy group, said Friday he believes the Pentagon is using the "safety" issue as an excuse so it can test its missile defense system's ability to shoot down a satellite. "Otherwise, they might have a hard time pulling this off," said Krepon. "But as it is, you don't hear any cries from Congress, do you?" Tom Gehrels, the former head of the University of Arizona's Spacewatch Project, which tracks asteroids that are a threat to earth, said shooting down the satellite makes sense to him. "I'm glad to hear it," he said. "Only one person we know for certain has ever been hit by something from space — that woman in Alabama hit with a meteorite in 1956. But all these satellites? After Australia, you never know."

[Dig]

EXCLUSIVE-U.S. plans to kill program to track objects from space
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/military/20080215-1637-lockheed-northrop-space.html
By Andrea Shalal-Esa REUTERS 4:37 p.m. February 15, 2008

WASHINGTON – The U.S. government plans to kill a beleaguered multibillion-dollar satellite program to track moving targets from space, a project championed by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, three defense officials and an industry source said Friday.

The Space Radar program has run into major resistance in Congress in recent years, with lawmakers citing cost and technology concerns about a nine-satellite program that the Air Force initially envisioned to cost $34 billion through 2025, according to globalsecurity.org.

Funding for Space Radar, aimed at giving the military an ”eye in the sky” view through all kinds of weather, has already shriveled in recent years and its timeline has been stretched, but now the program in its current form appears doomed.

The Air Force spent $183 million on the program in fiscal year 2007, but zeroed out its budget in 2008 and 2009, asking the Pentagon's National Reconnaissance Office to pay for continued development.

NRO funding is classified but one source said the program received $100 million in fiscal 2008 that ends Sept. 30.

“The NRO plans to remove funding for the program,” said a defense official who asked not to be named.

Lockheed Martin Corp and Northrop Grumman Corp are each leading teams bidding for the program. Northrop is supplying the radar for both teams.

Both teams have been working on small-scale concept studies to reduce risks and advance the technology needed for the program. No satellites were ever launched.

Air Force and NRO officials declined to comment.

Lockheed said it had not been notified of any change to the program. Northrop had no immediate comment.

“There are times when it's better to walk away and start over,” said a second senior defense official who asked not to be named. He said the U.S. military would clearly still seek to develop space-based radar capabilities in the future.

“The problem is that we've frittered away five or six years,” the official added. “It's a crying shame.”

A third defense official agreed that the intelligence and military communities remained keenly interested in developing the ability to track moving objects from space, and said a separate effort could be launched.

Space Radar was one of two large military space projects backed by Rumsfeld as vehicles to transform the U.S. military. The Air Force cut about $4 billion in funding from the other program, the Transformational Communications Satellite (TSAT) system over the next five years.

Both programs had already faced a “huge uphill battle” for funding, and those pressures were bound to get worse under the next White House administration, regardless of which party wins, given mounting budgetary pressures, one of the officials said.

“The fact that both of these initiatives from the Rumsfeld years are being cut tells you that the Rumsfeld agenda is rapidly ebbing away,” said Loren Thompson, senior analyst with the private Lexington Institute, who said he had also heard from government sources about the plan to kill the program.

[Dig]

Terminal Air
http://www.appliedautonomy.com/terminalair/index.html    

Terminal Air is a project that explores complex interconnections between government agencies and private contractors involved with the United States Central Intelligence Agency's extraordinary rendition program. Since the mid-90’s, the CIA has operated the extraordinary rendition program, in which suspected terrorists captured in Western nations are transported to secret locations for torture and interrogation. A thoroughly modern enterprise, the extraordinary rendition program is largely carried out using leased equipment and private contractors. These private charter planes often use civilian airports for refueling, making their movements subject to public record and visible to anyone who knows which tail numbers to look for. However, while these missions are carried out under the guise of protecting the American people, the nature of the program has thus far remained out of reach to both American and International law. With only the knowledge of what these planes have been used for in the past, human rights activists are left to view their movements as a vast “black box” and can only speculate whether any specific plane is currently carrying human cargo en-route to being tortured in a so-called CIA “dark prison”.

Terminal Air was developed through a partnership between Trevor Paglen and the Institute for Applied Autonomy. Support has been provided by Rhizome, Kurator.org and the Plymouth Arts Center.

[Beefcake]

I don't believe for a second that they would abandon this program.  They are probably working on improving it. 

[Dig]

More stuff (it is like wearechange meets space weapon lobbyists): http://www.paglen.com/pages/projects.htm

[Dig]

I don't believe for a second that they would abandon this program.  They are probably working on improving it. 

At least they admitted it exists, that is an improvement.

[JTCoyoté]

If you wish to watch the orbital progress on this satellite .... here's a link or two.

http://www.n2yo.com/satellite.php?s=29651

http://www.n2yo.com/?s=29651

JTCoyoté

''...on every question of construction [of the Constitution],
[let us] carry ourselves back to the time when the
Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit
manifested in the Debates, & instead of trying
what meaning may be squeezed out of the text,
or invented against it, conform to the probable one
in which it was passed.'' ~THOMAS JEFFERSON

[onehundredmonkeys]

If you wish to watch the orbital progress on this satellite .... here's a link or two.

http://www.n2yo.com/satellite.php?s=29651

http://www.n2yo.com/?s=29651

JTCoyoté

''...on every question of construction [of the Constitution],
[let us] carry ourselves back to the time when the
Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit
manifested in the Debates, & instead of trying
what meaning may be squeezed out of the text,
or invented against it, conform to the probable one
in which it was passed.'' ~THOMAS JEFFERSON

sorry, but thatone has 'wannabee' data.
The inclination is wrong for one , the latest element set i read:
1 70000U          08042.43411819  .00170715  00000-0  25000-3 0    06
2 70000  58.4821  69.5983 0009338  66.1500 294.0578 16.04437931    01
where iclin shows 58.4821

[onehundredmonkeys]

Recent European pass:

And a 'closeup' (made by John Locker)

[onehundredmonkeys]

Iran launched its first locally made rocket into space simultaneously with the inauguration of its first domestic satellite complex. The rocket, dubbed Kavoshgar (explorer), was sent off to space from the launch pad on an official order from the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2C4xSwcKxWs&feature=related

That is all they probably did, launching a rocket without satellite. And  where 'space' starts is debatable.
Politically it has more value though

[Dig]

Experts Scoff at Sat Shoot-Down Rationale (Updated)
http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/02/fishy-rationale.html
By Noah Shachtman February 15, 2008 | 4:34:00 PMCategories: Missiles, Space   



The Pentagon says it has to shoot down a malfunctioning spy satellite because of the threat of a toxic gas cloud.  Space security experts are calling the rationale highly unlikely. "Having the US government spend millions of dollars to destroy a billion-dollar failure to save zero lives is comedic gold," one tells DANGER ROOM.

Yesterday, Deputy National Security Advisor James Jeffrey said the satellite's tank full of hydrazine rocket propellant was the main reason the military was planning to blast the orbiter.  There's a small but real risk that the hydrazine tank could rupture, releasing a "toxic gas" over a "populated area," causing a "risk to human life."

But, as we noted yesterday, Joint Chiefs of Staff Vice Chairman Gen. James Cartwright cast the threat from the satellite in much less dire terms. Even if the hydrazine were released, he noted, the effects would likely be mild -- akin to chlorine gas poisoning, which can cause burning in the lungs, and elsewhere. The area affected would be "roughly the size of two football fields [where you might] incur something that would make you go to the doctor."

And that doesn't sound like much of a risk at all.

Especially when you consider that several other hydrazine-filled object have come crashing down to Earth.  Not only did the space shuttle Columbia have a similar tank, which survived re-entry, with no toxic gas cloud.  Several other hydrazine-laced objects have also crashed into the atmosphere, with no ill effects.  Space researcher Ed Kyle notes that there were 42 major reentry objects for 2007, including 9 satellites -- at least one of which contained a form of hydrazine, UMDH (unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine).

In addition, roughly 8-12 upper stages that originally contained UDMH reentered during 2007. Some of these could very well have contained some residual propellant.  [One particular] upper stage probably contained several hundred [kilgograms] of residual propellant, for example.

Which leads one military satellite observer to tell DANGER ROOM, "Everything they said made sense except for the reason for doing the intercept in the first place."

"The hydrazine tank is a 1-meter sphere containing about 400 liters of hydrazine. The stated hazard area is about 2 hectares, something like 1/10,000,000,000 of the area under the orbit," he adds.  The potential for actual harm in unbelievably small.  Which means the hydrazine rationale just doesn't hold up, literally not within orders of magnitude."

"The cynic in me says that the idea that this is being done to protect the lives of humans is simply a feel-good cover story tossed to the media," another veteran space security specialist adds.  "It is true that hydrazine is very toxic and could result injury or death, but the odds of this happening are minuscule.  The average person in American is many thousands of times more likely to be killed in a car accident than by any falling debris.  In fact, no one has ever been killed by space debris (I have heard of one or two being struck but only minor injuries).  So pretty much everything else you can think of (including getting hit by an asteroid/comet) is many times more likely than dying from this.  Having the US government spend millions of dollars to destroy a billion-dollar failure to save zero lives is comedic gold."

"There has to be another reason behind this," said Michael Krepon, co-founder of the Henry L. Stimson Center, tells the Washington Post. "In the history of the space age, there has not been a single human being who has been harmed by man-made objects falling from space."

So what could that other reason be?

Our veteran space security specialist believes there are several. To him, the satellite shot is a chance for the military to try out its missile defense capabilities; a way to keep secret material out of the wrong hands; and a warning to the Chinese, after they destroyed a satellite about a year ago.  He shared some educated guesses:

My first thought is that MDA [Missile Defense Agency] is always looking for ways to pimp their systems and provide further justification that they work.  The upcoming change in Administration is almost guaranteed to result in missile defense losing the top-level advocacy that it has enjoyed for the last several years.  Any additional missions and justifications that the missile defense community can provide would increase the likelihood of their systems (and budgetary power) surviving.

An additional reason could be that destroying the satellite would prevent any chance of another nation getting access to any of the potentially sensitive technology on board.  However, I have heard from other sources that supposedly the NRO [National Reconnaissance Office - the country's spy satellite shop] is actually against the "shootdown" (and I hate that term - the satellite is not flying and is coming down regardless of whether or not it gets hit by a missile). Their absence at the press briefing could lend some weight to this rumor, although it could also be explained by the nature of the satellite and its still classified link to the NRO.

My real concern is that this is simply a knee-jerk reaction made by the Administration in response to the purported threat by the Chinese. Since the April 2007 ASAT [anti-satellite] test, there have been rumors and whispers going around that the Administration and like-minded individuals are looking for more sticks (instead of carrots) to use against China. While this "shoot down" is not a direct action against China, it would be a clear signal that the US can possess an active ASAT capability at any time if it so desires.  That is a serious development as the previous US ASAT system using F-15s was mothballed in the 1980's. 

There are many significant political ramifications that would happen as a result of this.  The US has been berating the Chinese on their ASAT test but now demonstrate that it is okay as long as it occurs at a low enough altitude to prevent long-lasting debris and can "save lives".  This is close to an implied "ok" for the US and other nations to conduct more ASAT tests, which could open another arms race.  I am also certain that Russian and China would also see this as a slap in the face as they are trying to revive the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space treaty discussion and ban on space weapons.  It would further negatively affect the relations between them and the US.  Which could lead to increased tensions, arms buildup, etc etc etc.  Nothing good for anyone outside of arms manufacturers and politicians that need a bogeyman to scare people into voting for them.

Oh, and [NASA Adminsitrator Mike] Griffin's presence at the briefing was also an indicator to me that they are trying to spin this as a safety issue and not a missile  defense / ASAT test.  NASA has absolutely nothing to do with US Strategic Command using a Navy missile to blow up a broken NRO satellite. This is a military/national security op from the start and the only reason you trot the NASA Administrator out is to try and convince people otherwise.

UPDATE: Regardless of the central rationale for the anticipated intercept of a dying satellite, the action almost certainly would offer the Pentagon useful data on conducting antisatellite missions, our own Jeffrey Lewis tells Global Security Newswire.

The dead U.S. satellite is to be struck at a significantly lower altitude than other space assets.  However, that could prove even more of a challenge to the Navy than any future antisatellite operation because spacecraft on lower orbits typically travel at higher speeds, Lewis said.

The upcoming shot — using a sea-based Standard Missile 3 developed for regional and tactical missile defense — could thus prove to be a useful test for less demanding intercepts that might someday follow, he said.

“The higher a satellite is [in space], the slower it moves, more or less,” Lewis said.  “This is a perfectly good ASAT test.”

...Asked if it would be fair for other nations to regard the Standard Missile 3 as an antisatellite-capable weapon if the upcoming mission is successful, Cartwright said it was “a fair question and a good question.”

However, he said, the Navy has implemented for this action a “one-time” modification to the three ships and missiles, which “would not be transferable to a fleet configuration.”

For their part, “the Chinese are going to use this to excuse their otherwise inexcusable test,” Lewis said.  “And those other countries who we count on to create a norm against debris-creating ASATs will be less willing to help us” in that effort, he said.

That said, Lewis added, “maybe they’ll buy the hydrazine story.”


Inside America's Satellite-Killing Missile
Skeptical About the Rogue Spy Sat 'Shot'
Pentagon Unveils Rogue Spy Sat Shoot-Down Plan
Pentagon to Shoot Down Rogue Satellite
U.S. May Shoot Down Errant Satellite
Falling Spy Sat: Don't Panic
Spy Satellite Will Plummet to Earth
How China Loses the Coming Space War (Pt. 1)
How China Loses the Coming Space War (Pt. 2)
How China Loses the Coming Space War (Pt. 3)
Ukraine Big: We Can Spot Your Sats, Control Space
How to Blow Up a Satellite
"Autonomous" Mini-Spacecraft Team up to Replace Big Sats
Video: Double Hit for Missile Interceptors
Missile Defense's Tight Fit
Missile Defense: Ready Now, or Ready Never?

[rphope]

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



Sources: Navy to shoot down failed satellite Thursday

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. Navy will likely attempt to shoot down a faulty spy satellite Thursday, the day after the space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to land, two officials told CNN Monday.

The officials -- who spoke on condition of anonymity because much of the planning remains classified -- said the idea is to leave as much time as possible so a second attempt could be made if necessary.

Because the 5,000-pound satellite malfunctioned immediately after launch in December 2006, it has a full tank of fuel. It would likely survive re-entry and disperse potentially deadly fumes over an area the size of two football fields, officials have said.

The Navy plans to fire at the satellite as it enters Earth's atmosphere at an altitude of about 150 miles.

Officials want the missile to hit the edge of the atmosphere to ensure debris re-enters and burns up quickly.

Without any intervention, Pentagon officials have said they believe the satellite would come down on its own in early March.

The option of striking the satellite with a missile launched from an Aegis cruiser was decided upon by President Bush after consultation with several government and military officials and aerospace experts, said Deputy National Security Adviser James Jeffrey.

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.

[onehundredmonkeys]

Preliminary shootdown area; GOOGLE-EARTH KMZ:
http://alan.clegg.com/files/USA193%20Shootdown.kmz

Jeff Umbarger :
> Hey All,
>      If I'm not mistaken at 3:30 UT in the Hawaiian
> Islands it is 17:30 local time. On that date the sun
> sets (for Honolulu anyways) at 18:30. So if you where
> attempting to observe from Oahu or Kauai, I believe
> (based on the plot) you would be looking into the
> setting sun. This would apply for the missile launch.
> However impact and follow through would track to the
> northwest - north - and then off to the northeast. Can
> anyone confirm?

Yes, that's correct. It would mean that within minutes, and while still illuminated by the sun, the debris would come in reach of tracking stations on the US west coast, who have darkness (astronomical twilight just ended there).

Coincidentally or not, this is during the totality phase of the lunar eclipse that same night. Good for optical tracking of faint fragments.
- Marco

-----
Dr Marco Langbroek  -  SatTrackCam Leiden, the Netherlands.

[onehundredmonkeys]

Preliminary shootdown area; GOOGLE-EARTH KMZ:
http://alan.clegg.com/files/USA193%20Shootdown.kmz

Jeff Umbarger :
> Hey All,
>      If I'm not mistaken at 3:30 UT in the Hawaiian
> Islands it is 17:30 local time. On that date the sun
> sets (for Honolulu anyways) at 18:30. So if you where
> attempting to observe from Oahu or Kauai, I believe
> (based on the plot) you would be looking into the
> setting sun. This would apply for the missile launch.
> However impact and follow through would track to the
> northwest - north - and then off to the northeast. Can
> anyone confirm?

Yes, that's correct. It would mean that within minutes, and while still illuminated by the sun, the debris would come in reach of tracking stations on the US west coast, who have darkness (astronomical twilight just ended there).

Coincidentally or not, this is during the totality phase of the lunar eclipse that same night. Good for optical tracking of faint fragments.
- Marco

-----
Dr Marco Langbroek  -  SatTrackCam Leiden, the Netherlands.

According to this NOTAM(Notice to Airman) bulletin:
    PHZH HONOLULU CONTROL FACILITY

    02/062 (A0038/08) - AIRSPACE CARF NR. 90 ON EVELYN STATIONARY RESERVATION WITHIN AN AREA BNDD BY 3145N 17012W 2824N 16642W 2352N 16317W 1909N 16129W 1241N 16129W 1239N 16532W 1842N 17057W 2031N 17230W 2703N 17206W SFC-UNL. 21 FEB 02:30 2008 UNTIL 21 FEB 05:00 2008. CREATED: 18 FEB 12:51 2008

[Anti_Illuminati]

http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message506541/pg1

From Spaceweather.com

they seem to have removed the story now?

but here is a link to his pic:

http://mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk/satcom_transits/USA__193x2.jpg

PROOF there are NO SOLAR ARRAYS

This pic was extremely hard to find so I've uploaded it to GLP incase it disappears..



---
from original spaceweather.com story:

SPYING BACK: Last December 23rd, USA 193 flew over England where veteran satellite observer John Locker was waiting with his 8-inch telescope. Guiding the optics by hand with a webcam at prime focus, he photographed the shadowy spy satellite:

At first glance, the image seems indistinct, but a closer inspection reveals much: "What can be seen is the golden body of the satellite and a lighter-colored sensor array," says Locker. "More importantly, what cannot be seen are solar panels, assuming it has them. Solar panels would make the spacecraft about 20 meters across. However, the widest point on the image is 4 to 5 meters.

[rphope]

The spacecraft contains 1,000 pounds of hydrazine in a tank that is expected to survive re-entry and a fuel tank liner made of beryllium.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23189604/

The fact that they are willing to admit that the craft contains a mix of chemical and radioactive materials speaks volumes. All I know is on Thursday I will be in a secure location as we know:

- All US leaders are out of the country - with the exception of Cheney who is most likely in a bunker.
- FEMA has sent rapid response teams fanning across the country, ready to "assist" in the event of a tragedy.
- NWO Astrology and Numerology comes into play with the scheduled shootdown coincedently during a total Lunar Eclipse.

Probably this thing doesn't even pose a signifigant threat and they are really just testing a new speace weapon. Oh wait, that doesn't sound much better! Either way we slice it, IT IS VERY BAD.

[rphope]

I am posting in the Sticky http://forum.prisonplanet.com/index.php?topic=26984.0

[UpsetBrit]

If you want kids, i'd put it off for a while. Wait until you have less chance of it being born with 5 legs and 3 ears.

[rphope]

Thanks to a post by Anti_Illuminati I realized that I missed an entire article when I was detailing the radioactive material reported by the MSM to be onbaord (see earlier in the thead for proof if needed).

For one he links to a message posted over at godlikeproductions. I found this info that started the ball rolling http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message506705/pg1

I am afraid we all missed the point on this. This article details some technical aspects and makes an interesting theory about why there are 3 missles. You can read the post directly, I won't copy it verbatim here.

http://informationdissemination.blogspot.com/2008/02/observing-planning-to-intercept-us-193.html

However there is one criticle mention in that article that we need to be aware of.

According to CNN, three SM-3s have been modified for the intercept.

"They want the period of a day or two to assess the effect of the first missile ... to probably get an orbit or two, to get an understanding of what effect the first intercept had on the satellite before launching another interceptor," Ham said.

While some might assume this is because the SM-3 will miss, we are thinking this might be for a second shot because one may not be enough. There is a suggestion the fuel tank with the hydrazine is the primary target. That may be true, but it seems to us the secondary target should be the Radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG) that needs to be broken into smaller pieces as well to insure burn up.

Another reason we believe the Navy may take more than one shot is the details and requirements. Jeffery Lewis describes the details.

The intercept will occur at 240 kilometers (130 nautical miles)
The mass of the satellite is 2,300 kg (5,000 pounds)
The mass of the interceptor is 20 kg. (From CBO)
The closing velocity will be 9.8 km/s (22,000 mph), suggesting a virtually head-on collision.

I linked to find out what this is what I found.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator
A radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG) is a simple electrical generator which obtains its power from radioactive decay. In such a device, the heat released by the decay of a suitable radioactive material is converted into electricity by the Seebeck effect using an array of thermocouples. RTGs can be considered as a type of battery and have been used as power sources in satellites, space probes and unmanned remote facilities. RTGs are usually the most desirable power source for unmanned or unmaintained situations needing a few hundred watts or less of power for durations too long for fuel cells, batteries and generators to provide economically, and in places where solar cells are not viable.

The first two criteria limit the number of possible fuels to fewer than 30 atomic isotopes within the entire isotope table of elements. Plutonium-238, curium-244 and strontium-90 are the most often cited candidate isotopes, but other isotopes such as polonium-210, promethium-147, caesium-137, cerium-144, ruthenium-106, cobalt-60, curium-242 and thulium isotopes have also been studied. Of the above, 238Pu has the lowest shielding requirements and longest half-life. Only three candidate isotopes meet the last criterion (not all are listed above) and need less than 25 mm of lead shielding to control unwanted radiation. 238Pu (the best of these three) needs less than 2.5 mm, and in many cases no shielding is needed in a 238Pu RTG, as the casing itself is adequate.

238Pu has become the most widely used fuel for RTGs, in the form of plutonium(IV) oxide (PuO2). 238Pu has a half-life of 87.7 years, reasonable energy density and exceptionally low gamma and neutron radiation levels.


So what we have is the possibility that this satellite indeed is Nuclear powered and as such may contain large(?) amounts of Plutonium-238 on-board.

This is ofcourse very dangerous and would have far reaching and devistating implications should the satellite fall to earth. Even landing in the ocean one would think that this could pollute the entire water supply.

I don't know what to believe. I just wanted to pass this on for discussion, alert.

[berean]

   "And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."  Revelation 8:10-11

Might not be time yet for this prophecy to be fulfilled; but it's certainly now easy to see how it might be fulfilled....

[Jackson Holly]

~ NASA'S Plutonium Gamble ~
A Special Report by retired NASA Office of Inspector General Senior Special Agent
Joseph Richard Gutheinz, Jr., J.D.




http://www.paranoiamagazine.com/plutogamble.html

"Recently, we were again asked to trust NASA as it launched an Atlas V rocket carrying a plutonium-powered spacecraft dubbed "New Horizons." New Horizons was not the first plutonium-powered spacecraft and if NASA has its way it won't be the last. Each launch of a plutonium-powered rocket is like playing Russian roulette. This trend has disaster waiting in the wings and all of us could be its victims, either through radioactive fallout or an economic tsunami.

"The New Horizons Pluto-Kuiper Belt Mission was launched on January 19, 2006 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Cape Canaveral is near the ocean to the east of Kennedy Space Center and is controlled by the U.S. Air Force. The best place for civilians to observe launches is from Cocoa Beach to the south, a beach community that experiences an influx of tourists to observe these manmade spectacles. What Florida tourists likely don't know is that for the launch of New Horizons they may be at ground zero should the rocket explode and plutonium be released.

"It is comforting to some that NASA has proclaimed a 1 in 350 chance of this occurring; better odds than what NASA's bean counters gave for Challenger and Columbia prior to their disasters. However, NASA is concerned enough about this mission to have a multi-agency radiological contingency plan; you know, "just in case."

   
"The way you can tell the difference between tourists and residents during a launch of a rocket is that the tourists are enthralled and the residents often have concerned looks on their faces, worried about what the loss of another rocket would do to the local economy. I saw this concern when I first came to work at Kennedy Space Center, where I witnessed a local resident at a gas station make the sign of the cross as a rocket was launched.

"The fact is, the American public is well aware of the failures in the shuttle program but is often unaware of the numerous failures associated with the unmanned rocket program at Cape Canaveral. For example, on October 30, 1957, a Jupiter A Rocket went off course after takeoff and the mission had to be aborted. This was followed by the loss of a Jupiter AM-4 rocket on December 18, 1957; the re-entry loss of a nose cone capsule from a Thor-Able missile on April 23, 1958; and the failure of a Jupiter C missile on August 24, 1958.

"Ardent defenders of the space program will argue that these failures were at the early stages of space exploration and could be expected. However, the hard reality is that problems with rockets have plagued the space program throughout its history, and are now being experienced all over the world. On August 22, 2003, 21 people died in Brazil when a rocket exploded while being prepared for launch; and on June 21, 2005, a Russian rocket crashed into Siberia after takeoff.

"More alarming, three of NASA's accidents involved radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) containing plutonium-238, including the following:

* In 1964, a SNAP-9A satellite carrying two pounds of plutonium was eviscerated in the atmosphere.
* In 1968, a rocket failed during launch from Vandenberg AFB in California carrying a Nimbus B1 weather satellite and four pounds of plutonium, which crashed into the Pacific Ocean. The plutonium was reportedly recovered without leakage.
* In 1970, the ill-fated Apollo 13 mission returned to earth with its lunar module, containing a SNAP-27 RTG and eight pounds of plutonium. This module may still be sitting at the bottom of the ocean intact.

"A rocket loss with conventional payloads and fuel sources may be acceptable to some, even if it involves the potential for loss of life, as Brazil experienced. However, when plutonium fuel sources are used to lift spaceships, what is the benefit compared to the risk? Here NASA proudly admits there is only a 1 in 350 chance that one of the most deadly substances known to man could be released into the atmosphere. While scientists continue to argue just how much plutonium is necessary to kill by inhalation, the psychological and economic costs associated with a release of 24 pounds of fine grain plutonium are not easily disputed.

"Such a disaster would cover many miles of surface; depending on the altitude and wind speed at the time of the disaster it could cover thousands of miles and cost thousands of lives. It would be impossible to recover the lost plutonium from such a disaster and such a loss would depress or eliminate the property values of any place impacted. The federal government would no doubt send in billions of dollars to the impacted areas to help silence the uproar, but this would be a political stunt, not a serious medical response. Such an infusion of funds would dwarf the annual budget of NASA by comparison.

"There are those who argue that it would be wrong to lump the peaceful use of nuclear power into the same basket with nuclear weapons, as nuclear weapons destroy life and nuclear energy enhances life. Ironically, I have long believed that environmentalists should favor nuclear energy as something preferable to the primary energy alternatives in existence today. However, the prudent use of nuclear power is vastly different from attaching plutonium to a rocket and crossing your fingers.

"Honest advocates of the peaceful use of nuclear power will admit that, despite the best precautions, accidents do happen. Today nearly one-third of the energy produced in nuclear power plants is from plutonium, and nuclear safety specialists who think and talk about plutonium address the subject as a threat, whereas engineers who seek to harness its power treat it as a new frontier. The hard reality is that the Chernobyl accident on April 26, 1986 was not as unique an accident as nuclear energy proponents claim, and it is an accident that has already claimed many lives and which will claim perhaps thousands of lives well into the future.

"Some nuclear energy proponents argue that in depressed economies like the Ukraine, which was part of the Soviet Union at the time of the accident, safety protocols are ignored as a cost saving method. Regardless of whether this is true, it ignores the reality that nuclear accidents have occurred in the United States, as was the case with the Three Mile Island accident on March 28, 1979. NASA expresses confidence that launching plutonium is sufficiently safe, and I have to wonder at the basis for this confidence. Having investigated NASA in the past, I simply don't believe it.

"As a second-generation military intelligence officer and Special Agent having served in three Federal agencies, I was indoctrinated in the value of secrecy. Having a Top Secret clearance in the military, I was entrusted with secrets I will take to my grave. Likewise, as a Federal Agent I was privy to grand jury 6e material, which I treated in the same fashion and with the same care as military intelligence secrets. My father was a U.S. Marine Corps Officer, Infantry / Military Intelligence and I was a U.S. Army Aviator / Military Intelligence Officer. We shared the same politics and view of the world, yet we never divulged a single secret we learned in government. Secrecy, we believed, protected the innocent and was in the best interests of our country. Our nation's enemies did not need to know what we knew or how we knew it.

Nukes in Space

"The Cassini-Huygens mission is a joint project of NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) to explore Saturn and its moons. Launched in October 1997 and powered by 72.3 pounds of plutonium-238, Cassini circled the entire Earth only 312 miles above our heads. The 1999 Cassini "fly-by" heightened fears of an "inadvertent reentry" that could have dosed Earth's entire population.

"Dr. Helen Caldicott, of Physicians for Social Responsibility, explains that less than 1 millionth of a gram of plutonium is a carcinogenic dose. One pound, if uniformly distributed, could induce lung cancer in every person on Earth. These physicians believe NASA's plutonium accidents are responsible for a worldwide increase in cancer rates since that time. (see Grossman)

"Dr. Michio Kaku says NASA's environmental impact studies underestimated the possible risks of the Cassini mission. He notes that NASA's studies appeared as though accurate calculations had been made, but in reality "no full-scale test of any realistic accident scenario has ever been carried out." Rates of uncertainty cannot be calculated, he concludes, because NASA's numbers are all "educated guesses." NASA's facts and figures are assumed to be correct and are not to be questioned.

"NASA claimed that solar power wouldn't work for Cassini because the probe would be too far from the sun. NASA had also claimed the Galileo mission had no other alternative than nuclear power. Weeks after its launch, a JPL study showed that Galileo could have used solar power without impacting its objectives.

"Physicist Carla Signorini stated in 1995, "If given the money to do the work, within five years [ESA] could have solar cells ready to power a space mission to Saturn." Yet, NASA and ESA still use nuclear fuel on deep space missions because the budgets for solar power systems are "a grain of sand from the huge bucket in which nuclear research is funded."

"Many now believe that NASA is motivated more by a desire for military funding, and that plutonium fueled space missions will indirectly aid public acceptance of the nuclear weaponization of space. Against the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, NASA's $3 billion Project Prometheus program will place nuclear reactors on the moon from where it will launch atomic-propelled rockets.

(See: www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Parliament/2191/Cassini.htm
Karl Grossman, The Wrong Stuff: The Space Program's Nuclear Threat to Our Planet; the video, Nukes In Space 2: Unacceptable Risks; and google: "How NASA Calculates Risk.")

'However, history tells us that the government maintains two types of secrets: white secrets maintained for the greater good, and black secrets maintained to shield officials from allegations of incompetence or criminal wrongdoing. Examples of black secrets include studies allegedly conducted by our government or conducted with its cooperation, including subjecting soldiers to exposure to radiation to discern their ability to withstand exposure in combat and continue to fight. Some service members were subjected to mustard gas contamination to discern their reaction. American civilian communities were subjected to non-lethal bacterial agents to discern its spread from an aerial platform. In the 1960s, military intelligence used LSD on volunteers to document its effects. These experiments were kept secret for decades for obvious reasons: the public would have been justifiably outraged.

"With this in mind, one of my concerns with New Horizons, and the plutonium space missions that will follow, is what we will not be told in the event of an accident. I can envision a scenario where the public is not informed of a plutonium release because nothing can be done, and secrecy would be officially employed to prevent a panic. NASA and the government could also use such secrecy to conceal poor decision-making.

I"n 1997, I investigated the Mir fire and crash and asked myself why NASA would risk so much for so little. NASA sent its astronauts to the Mir when the Mir was dysfunctional and experiencing life threatening problems. NASA paid the Russians to fly our astronauts on the Mir, a platform that from time to time was spinning out of control, literally. The International Space Station is yet another orbital platform which goes endlessly in circles without going anywhere. Like the Mir and the International Space Station, New Horizons is a mission with a great deal of urgency attached to it, but without a clear explanation of how it can benefit humankind.

"New Horizons is being sent to obtain information on Pluto, Chiron and the Kuiper Belt, and plutonium is being used to accelerate that mission through space. What is the urgency? Pluto and Chiron aren't going anywhere and neither is the human race. NASA likes to gamble, but a plutonium accident might not only cost lives but impact NASA's very existence. As in the story of the hare and the tortoise, the hare gets off to a fast start but loses in the end. NASA must become like the tortoise, slow and surefooted, if it is to explore space in a safe manner."

[J1Q]

Hey Guys, been reading on PP for a long time now and this is my first Post, so i'm just going to jump right in.

In the Associated Press' story they said their was going to be 6 FEMA rescue teams placed across the country in case they "miss" the satellite. So, this got me to thinking, where were these 6 rescue teams going to be placed. I mean i'd like to know. so i called FEMA yesterday and inquired into these 6 supposed "rescue" teams. According to FEMA they had no idea what i was talking about. So i dug a little deeper and called the actual journalist at teh AP who wrote the story and he said they would not disclose that information to him as to where the teams were going to be placed.

Is there anyway we can find this out, because i would love to know where these FEMA teams are located. May give us an idea of the cities that we should be concerned about??

[rphope]

Hey Guys, been reading on PP for a long time now and this is my first Post, so i'm just going to jump right in.

In the Associated Press' story they said their was going to be 6 FEMA rescue teams placed across the country in case they "miss" the satellite. So, this got me to thinking, where were these 6 rescue teams going to be placed. I mean i'd like to know. so i called FEMA yesterday and inquired into these 6 supposed "rescue" teams. According to FEMA they had no idea what i was talking about. So i dug a little deeper and called the actual journalist at teh AP who wrote the story and he said they would not disclose that information to him as to where the teams were going to be placed.

Is there anyway we can find this out, because i would love to know where these FEMA teams are located. May give us an idea of the cities that we should be concerned about??

Wow, now that's initiative! I find it humorous that FEMA wouldn't know where they are sending their own teams. I have no idea how we could ever know until and unless something happens.

They are going to shoot this thing as it is head on into North America!

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/02/sat-shoot-down.html

Satellite Shoot-Down Set: Intercept Near Hawaii; Debris Cloud Over Canada (Updated)

As you probably know by now, the U.S. military is going to try to shoot down a dying satellite on Thursday, around 10:30 pm eastern time, before it plummets into the atmosphere.  That's right smack in the middle of a lunar eclipse, which should make the machine easier to track.  Satellite-watchers have figured out where the Navy cruiser will take its shot -- and where the debris cloud is likely to go afterwards.

The red line represents the path of the satellite.  The pink shape, bounded by blue lines, is the "restricted area" above the cruisers.  (The military has blocked out almost the same area, 24 hours later, in case the first shot misses.) And those yellow splotches are Hawaii.  As you can see, the Navy plans to take the satellite out over the Pacific.  Which is not unexpected.

More startling, veteran satellite-watcher AT says, is where the debris cloud will go. "To my considerable surprise, it's on an ascending pass that will take the debris cloud across central Canada a few minutes later. Then across a bit of western Africa and eastern Australia." Here's the plot:

UPDATE: Zarya  notes that this wasn't the only option of when to take down the satellite, designated USA-193. "The interception could have been set for a time when USA-193 was passing over the area in a southbound direction." On February 21, that'll be around 7:55 PM eastern.  And on the first pass, at least, the debris cloud would appear to steer clear of densely-populated zones.

However, "there are some disadvantages in the southbound option," Zarya cautions. "The interception would occur in the Earth's shadow so optical tracking close to the event would not be possible, and the next few orbital passes overfly significant population centres," including "populated parts of Africa, the Middle East, southern Russia, other south Asian states, the Peoples' Republic of China, and Europe."

[Brendan]

Source:http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/02/19/sat_shoot_notam_airspace_warning_declared/


US declares 1400-mile Pacific sat-shoot exclusion zone

Airspace bar from surface to 'unlimited' altitude

By Lewis Page
Published Tuesday 19th February 2008 09:59 GMT

The US military has issued a warning notice barring flights above a large area of the northern Pacific for two and a half hours early on Thursday morning. The stricken spy satellite marked for destruction by US warships will pass over the taped-off area just at this time, indicating that the first shot will take place then.

The NOTAM (NOTice To AirMen) warning reads:

02/062 (A0038/08) - AIRSPACE CARF NR. 90 ON EVELYN STATIONARY RESERVATION WITHIN AN AREA BNDD BY 3145N 17012W 2824N 16642W 2352N 16317W 1909N 16129W 1241N 16129W 1239N 16532W 1842N 17057W 2031N 17230W 2703N 17206W SFC-UNL. 21 FEB 02:30 2008 UNTIL 21 FEB 05:00 2008. CREATED: 18 FEB 12:51 2008

A "CARF" (Central Altitude Reservation Function) designation indicates a NOTAM intended to keep commercial and private flights clear of military operations, and SFC-UNL means the height band of this warning zone reaches from the surface to "unlimited" altitude - in other words all the way into space. The UTC time referred to is the same as UK time, so the zone exists from 0230 to 0500 on Thursday morning for British readers.

The latitudes and longitudes can be plotted with the crippled spy sat's ground track overlaid, which has been done by satellite watcher Ted Molczan in handy pdf form here. Those running Google Earth can get a better look using this kmz file, compiled by Molczan's fellow sky-watcher Alan Clegg from the pdf.

As will be evident, the barred area is a cool 1,400 miles long and nearly 700 miles wide at the surface, giving the US Navy plenty of elbow room to fire their interceptor missiles up into the descending spacecraft's path.

Reports have it that three US Aegis air-defence warships, the cruiser Lake Erie and the destroyers Decatur and Russell, will be waiting for the satellite west of Hawaii. Each ship carries a specially modified Standard SM-3 interceptor, originally intended for defence against lower-flying ballistic missile warheads. The three interceptors are on separate ships in case of a technical issue with the Aegis radar and fire-control system.

As it passes over the firing area, the satellite will be approximately 3,000 miles and ten minutes out from the western coast of Canada, the next land it will pass over. The satellite has much more mass than the soaring "exo-atmospheric kill vehicle" it will smack into, so this gives some idea of the onward track the wreckage might follow in the event of a hit.

The Pentagon believes most of the resulting debris from a successful shot will burn up soon afterwards, and almost all should be gone within "two orbits". Boosters and other gubbins from the interceptors will presumably fall within the ocean NOTAM area.

The firing area seems to have been chosen so as to minimise the chances of debris falling anywhere other than in the ocean or North America, which could lend credence to the idea that the intercept is primarily aimed at safeguarding the satellite's technology.

Source:http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/02/19/sat_shoot_notam_airspace_warning_declared/

[lee51]

Questions: how far reaching would the nuclear fallout be from this?  Would Seattle be at risk from nuclear fallout? What about Hawaii since it is even nearer? 

Most important question: where is President Bush's two girls? Is Mrs. Bush with him in Africa?

[rphope]

NASA Administrator Mike Griffin took part in 1986 Delta 180 experiment codenamed Vector Sum!!! The Shootdown of Spysat US-193 is nearly identical as in the 1986 test.

http://www.livescience.com/blogs/author/leonarddavid

Spysat SmackDown: A Touch of Star Wars History
February 18th, 2008
Author Leonard David

All signals are apparently go for the attempted missile smackdown of the errant U.S. spysat and its frozen cargo of nasty-to-be-near hydrazine.

During a Valentine Day Department of Defense media briefing, NASA Administrator, Mike Griffin joined Deputy National Security Advisor James Jeffrey, as well as General James Cartwright, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff - all there to talk about steps to counter the failed National Reconnaissance Office spacecraft.

It turns out that the NASA chief has some history — not noted at the media briefing — in regards to head-on collisions in space.

Prior to his NASA top job, Griffin held a post at The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory where he was a Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO) project engineer for the 1986 Delta 180 experiment. It was the first space intercept of a target during powered flight - codenamed Vector Sum.

That experiment involved two Delta upper stages that were intentionally collided in low Earth orbit, orbital debris expert, Donald Kessler, advised me. The planning of that event was classified at the time, but is listed in the History of On-Orbit Satellite Fragmentations, issued by the NASA Johnson Space Center in July 1998.

Kessler worked with Griffin at that time as part of a safety panel to ensure that the experiment did not cause a hazard to other spacecraft. Griffin, the entire SDIO team, along with NASA, performed a safe experiment, obtaining loads of data in the process, Kessler added.

Griffin is very much aware of what could be done in the slamming of the rogue U.S. spysat, Kessler pointed out. “The on-orbit issues are nearly identical as in 1986 and the NASA orbital debris team has since developed the capability to understand the hazard on the ground,” he added.

“So NASA did have a lot to bring to the table for the spysat case,” Kessler concluded.

[rphope]

http://msnbcmedia4.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/050412/050412_nasa_griffin_vmed.widec.jpg



New NASA chief confirmed
Griffin takes over agency at key time

WASHINGTON - Michael Griffin, a physicist who has worked in space programs both private and public, was confirmed Wednesday by the Senate as the 11th administrator of NASA.

Griffin, 55, will leave his job as head of the space department at Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory. He replaces Sean O’Keefe, who resigned in February after three years to become chancellor at Louisiana State University.

“Dr. Griffin’s extensive background in space and science will serve him and NASA well,” Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, the chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, said in a statement following the vote. “Dr. Griffin’s first task will be to ensure that the shuttle program gets back on its feet safely and effectively. NASA needs its next administrator immediately.”

President Bush’s nomination of Griffin to head the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was confirmed by the Senate by voice vote. The Senate Commerce Committee had forwarded the nomination to the full Senate after generally glowing reviews of Griffin’s background and vision for the space agency.

Lawmakers had sought swift confirmation to put Griffin in charge before the next space shuttle mission, which is schedule for May. No shuttle has flown since the Columbia disintegrated over Texas in February 2003.

“The United States needs to look in new directions and look beyond where we have been in the last several decades,” Griffin told the panel during a hearing Tuesday.

Griffin expressed unreserved support for Bush’s call for humans to return to the moon in the next 10 to 15 years and for human exploration of Mars and beyond. However, he said having the space shuttle service the International Space Station did not qualify as a good risk for human space flight.

Lawmakers urged Griffin to save the Hubble Space Telescope, which is running down and needs repair — a costly mission not without risk to astronauts. He said he would reassess the possibility of a manned mission to the telescope after shuttle flights resume.

Griffin, who holds seven degrees, joined Johns Hopkins in 2004 after serving as president and chief executive officer of a CIA-funded enterprise that worked on national security projects.

His career has included work with Orbital Sciences Corp. and with NASA as chief engineer and associate administrator for exploration.

[Dig]

They are going to shoot this thing as it is head on into North America!

Bush never did like the West Coast

[tattoo8118]

I haven't read to much on what is going on with the satellites I would just like to add that on my way to work this morning here in Northern Nevada, I saw something large enter the earth's atmosphere and burn up.  By no means was this a "shooting star" because I've seen enough to know better.  It was around 5:30 am PST.  The object turned green, then burst into a large fireball.  Everyone I ride to work with was in amazement.  Does anyone know if there was anything scheduled for destuction today???

[rphope]

I haven't read to much on what is going on with the satellites I would just like to add that on my way to work this morning here in Northern Nevada, I saw something large enter the earth's atmosphere and burn up.  By no means was this a "shooting star" because I've seen enough to know better.  It was around 5:30 am PST.  The object turned green, then burst into a large fireball.  Everyone I ride to work with was in amazement.  Does anyone know if there was anything scheduled for destuction today???

Could this be what you saw? Strange with everything going on.


http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/6420ap_wa_meteor_sighting.html

Meteor seen across Pacific Northwest

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

SPOKANE, Wash. -- A number of people in the Northwest reported seeing a meteor before dawn this morning, about 5:30.

TV stations in Spokane reported viewer calls about sightings from Eastern Washington, north Idaho, parts of Oregon and southeastern British Columbia.

A Federal Aviation Administration spokesman in Seattle says a pilot reported seeing a burst of light in Adams County. The FAA originally attributed that sighting to a Horizon Airlines pilot but the agency and the airline now say that's incorrect. It was a private pilot.

The Adams County sheriff's office and State Patrol say they had no reports of an impact.

[rphope]

Meteor seen, felt across wide swath of Pacific Northwest

http://www.union-bulletin.com/articles/2008/02/19/local_news/local0.txt

SPOKANE (AP) — A meteor streaked through the sky over the Pacific Northwest and apparently landed in Eastern Washington early Tuesday.

A Horizon Airlines pilot reported seeing the meteorite hit earth with a flash and a burst of light near State Route 26 and the Lind-Hatton Road in the southeast corner of Adams County about 5:45 a.m. PST, said Mike Fergus, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman in Seattle.

Sheriff's dispatchers said they had no reports of damage, injury or a meteor landing in the area, about 175 miles east-southeast of Seattle and 90 miles southwest of Spokane. Washington State Patrol Lt. Robert D. Kerwin said there was no indication of a traffic disruption.

Fergus said he did not have the pilot's flight number, point of origin, destination or altitude at the time of the sighting.

A number of pilots reported seeing the meteor streaking through the sky from Boise, Idaho, into Washington state, an FAA duty officer said without giving his name.

Television stations in Spokane reported getting viewer calls from across Washington state and north Idaho, parts of Oregon and southeastern British Columbia, starting about 5:30 a.m.

The callers said it resembled summer lightning, a rocket, a satellite or an exploding transformer. A viewer from Walla Walla, about 55 miles south-southeast of the reported crash site, said she heard a sonic boom and felt a shock wave not long after seeing the streaking meteor.

--------------------------------------

There are too many coincidences surrounding this this whole satellite story.

[tattoo8118]

yes It seems that is what I saw, I've just never seen one turn green, then put out a flash like this one.

[tattoo8118]

ya there are too many coincidences, could it be more disinfo???

[rphope]

I am no expert on disinfo. I would say they are really trying to get our attention turned towards the sky this week though. We have the shuttle landing, Lunar Eclipse (Red Moon), and then the shootdown.

Look at this, is this what you saw?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23236766/

Ray Eickmeyer of Entiat, Wash., told KING 5 he was travelling southbound on Highway 97A when a very large shooting star traffic light green in color came down.

Eickmeyer said the meteor hit the ground just north of Waterville Plateau. Even with his car radio on, Eickmeyer said he could hear the impact. He added he then saw multiple lights flash, about 8 or 9 times. He described seeing a big hole in the ground and added he's never seen an impact that big.

KING also received emails from viewers in Sequim, Edgewood, Monroe and North Bend who said they also saw what looked like a fireball or dud firework coming down around 5:30 a.m.

"The colors were just beautiful, and it seemed so close even though it was probably quite far away," writes viewer Nance Anderson.

The meteor was spotted all the way south in the Portland area. Spokane television stations also received viewer calls from much of Eastern Washington and North Idaho about the meteor. Various callers to the station said it resembled summer lightning, a rocket, a satellite or an exploding transformer.

[tattoo8118]

yep, looks like it.