or does anyone else wonder if an SDI Satellite floating around up there was NOT told that the shuttle was one of ours and NOT to blast a hole in the wing with a laser or plasma weapon?
I think any satellite based weapon system would have to fire projectiles rather than raw energy. They couldn't put enough energy to sustain a laser/plasma weapon.. nor would such a weapon be terribly effective against a vehicle designed to withstand incredible amounts of heat.
Further, it if was a satellite-based weapon system I wouldn't think that it would have been an "accident", exactly... though it does seem like a rather stupid "test target".. kinda costly and news-breaking compared to blowing up some old orbiting junk..
F Monkey is right. Particle beam or plasma weapons are still not as advanced as we all want (or dread) to believe. Most SDI weapons systems depend on kinetic energy to do the job. Most use a shot gun approach - firing hundreds of "pellets" at the target with the goal of shreading the platform or at minimum damaging systems that are not supported by backup infrastructure like solar panels, batteries, sensors etc. If the shuttle was the target of such a weapon I think the damage would have been more widespread would have effected a correspondingly quicker "end" to the mission.
However - my wife claims she saw a national news blurb about an amateur astronomer in Arizona that had a video he shot from his tlelescope showing an object striking the Shuttle. The story went on to report that his video tape and all of his equipment were taken by the military for further investigation. Neather of us has seen any follow up on this report.
Originally posted by Steven Wood ... my wife claims she saw a national news blurb about an amateur astronomer in Arizona that had a video he shot from his tlelescope showing an object striking the Shuttle. The story went on to report that his video tape and all of his equipment were taken by the military for further investigation. Neather of us has seen any follow up on this report.
While something like that would be pretty amazing, in my experience when a story appears and disappears like that it's usually because it's been debunked/proven false, etc and the media is too image-conscious to admit it..
02-14-2003 04:09 AM
