SKYLAB Revisited

Skylab ain't falling , the US Navy is shooting it down.....
what a glorious kickoff to sweater Nite 10 it would be if the US Navy Shoots down this rebelious satelite on FeB 29th.....we will have to order a special round of shots to commemorate this occasion.....Go Navy !! Beat Skylab !!




February 15, 2008 -- Fearful of top-secret US technology falling into the wrong hands and the risk posed by toxic rocket fuel, the government yesterday said it will launch a missile to blow a failed spy satellite out of the sky.

The military will fire the missile within two weeks, aiming for the satellite's fuel tank, which carries lethal hydrazine propellant, Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a Pentagon press conference.

"When you inhale it, it affects tissues in lungs and has the burning sensation," he said. "If you stick close to it and inhale it, it could be deadly."

The satellite, US-193, was launched Dec. 14, 2006, but technicians lost radio contact with it in a matter of hours, and its solar panels were never fully deployed.

"This is the first time we've used a tactical missile to engage a spacecraft," Cartwright said.

The SM-3 Aegis ballistic missile, built by Raytheon, is normally used to target other rockets.

After extensive study and analysis, US officials came to the conclusion that "we're better off taking the attempt than not," Cartwright said.

He said the SM-3 would intercept the satellite just prior to it re-entering Earth's atmosphere. It would be "next to impossible" to hit the satellite after that because of atmospheric disturbances, he said.

Officials said the window of opportunity would open in about three days and last about eight days. Experts predict that the satellite would be intercepted somewhere over Hawaii.

"They've generally tested by Hawaii, most of the ships are stationed there, certainly the ships that have the most practice at it," John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, which studies space defense technologies, told The Post.

Officials said there will be two armed Navy ships on standby in case the first launch misses.

It was not known where the satellite would land. But officials familiar with the situation said about half of the 5,000-pound spacecraft is expected to survive its blazing descent through the atmosphere and will scatter debris - some of it potentially hazardous - over several hundred miles.

Pike said there was almost no way to tell where the satellite would land even after the missile hit but estimated a 90 percent chance of success based on the SM-3's track record.

"It's going to come down where it's going to come down, and the location of the intercept is unrelated to [that]," he said. "Most of the debris will still be going at an orbital velocity - the stuff is just going to keep going."

"The thing would be broken up into a bunch of bits and pieces, so that would reduce the possibility that some piece of sensitive technology would wind up on eBay - where the Russians and the Chinese would get into a bidding war for it," he said.

Officials have said there is about 1,000 pounds of hydrazine propellant on the satellite.

The missile "will break the fuel tank open," Pike said. "And that means the propellant will disperse and burn up at the top of the atmosphere, rather than falling in some man's pasture and killing a bunch of his cows."

Deputy National Security Adviser James Jeffrey said that members of Congress were briefed on the plan earlier yesterday and that diplomatic notifications to other countries would be made before the end of the day.