Chinese Satellite Creates Huge Mess
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It looks like the Chinese have managed to achive a couple of firsts in the history of space travel. They’re the first ones to use and anti=satellite weapon aboard one satellite to destroy another. In so doing, they’ve also become the first to create a navigation hazard in Low Earth Orbit.
NASA’s Terra Satellite Moved to Avoid Chinese ASAT Debris
WASHINGTON - Flight controllers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., had to maneuver the Terra environmental spacecraft in late June to avoid orbital debris created by the Jan. 11 test of a Chinese anti-satellite (A-Sat) weapon.
NASA officials said July 5 that the event marked the first time the agency has had to move one of its spacecraft to avoid a potential collision with debris created by the controversial Chinese A-Sat test.
Thanks guys, it’s not like we had enough of that nonsense here on the ground, you had to bring it into space.
Oh, as far as claims by Chinese officials that this anti-satellite test is not a threat, who do they think they’re kidding? Of course it’s a threat and in response to that threat we can expect an orbital arms race (if it’s not already underway) and before you know it there’ll be as much weaponry in orbit as there is on the ground.
Technorati Tags: chinese, anti-satellite, weapon, orbit, threat, space, arms+race, news
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