So if I had the money (and it wouldn’t be too much) and the will, I could send debris in a counter-geostationary orbit and kill not only every damn DirecTV satellite, but the GPS system and any other junk that thinks it can just hang above the earth contrary to all that’s holy. And permanently destroy the geostatationary orbit… forever. Even render space elevators useless.
Holy shit. Think of the powah
Theoretically, but it would be massively complicated.
If you wanted to do it, though, you’d be best off trying to get something into a Geostationary orbital path at slightly faster than geostationary speed (and in a slightly elliptical orbit) that, after it was in place blew up kind of like a number 8 shot shotgun shell. Hundreds of thousands (even millions) of tiny pellets.
Probably. Welcome to the human condition.
Doesn’t work that simply. The amount of thrust required to direct the satellite depends upon the location and direction and speed of the satellite upon failure. The dynamics of finding “safe place here” is more complicated than pointing at the middle of the Pacific ocean. Orbital dynamics behave funny. And you’re relying on your system working after a failure. So what failed to cause the need for reentry? The propulsion system that you want to rely upon for the safety manuever? That is not the kind of problem that lends itself to installing a simple automated system.
All of them? If it was just saber rattling, any debris that didn’t reenter earth’s orbit are (in my opinion) irresponsibly fired projectiles in a currently uncrowded, but potentially (in the future) crowded room.
Fair enough, you’re certainly entitled to your opinion. Doesn’t mean others don’t feel the benefits of other actions outweigh the minimal future dangers.
Is your opinion the same of the Chinese action? If not, why not?
No, no. You can launch into the goestationary orbit, but in the opposite direction from the way the earth is spinning. This way you’re not “slightly faster and eliptical,” you are twenty times the speed of sound and perfectly on target.
If you launch 10 tons of 1-gram bullets, you have ten million fragments doing a full sweep every 12 hours.
My opinion is far lower of the Chinese action than the US action.
The Chinese action just wasn’t elaborated on in this thread.
On review the Master agrees he should have included a mention of Kessler syndrome and the column has been amended to include it.