Great Big Shoot-down: Military coordinates with NASA on falling satellite

William Atkins
Sunday, 17 February 2008 19:41

Science - Space

The United States has acknowledged that the destruction of the satellite will not endanger the International Space Station and its three-person crew and the space shuttle Atlantis and its seven-person crew.

The space station is in a roughly 210-mile (338-kilometer) orbit about the Earth. The military plan to hit the satellite when it is approximately 160 miles (258 kilometers) above the Earth.

The U.S. government is also telling countries around the world that its attempt to destroy the satellite is not part of any defensive military operation (anti-satellite defensive weapons program), only an attempt to minimize any serious problems in de-orbiting the bus-size satellite carrying a full load of dangerously toxic hydrazine fuel.

In fact, the military states that its attempt will be to make a direct-hit on the hydrazine tank onboard the satellite to assure it will not survive its descent through the Earth’s atmosphere and spew its toxic fuel onto the surface of the Earth.

Deputy National Security Adviser James Jeffrey stated, "This is all about trying to reduce the danger to human beings. Specifically, there was enough of a risk for the president to be quite concerned about human life." [Fox News “U.S. Officials Defend Plan to Shoot Down Satellite”]

The weather forecast for Cape Canaveral, Florida, as of Sunday, February 17, 2008, calls for a temperature high of 70 degrees Fahrenheit (21 degrees Celsius), with a ten percent chance of precipitation and partly cloudy conditions.

If the weather holds, NASA should have no problem in landing at Kennedy.