Originally published February 21, 2008 at 6:41 a.m. PT
What do you do when a spy satellite goes kerflooey and starts to fall back to Earth? Call in the U.S. Navy. That was what President Bush decided to do to take out said defunct satellite before it could crash-land, with the potential, the government says, of spewing a toxic fuel called hydrazine in a populated area.
At about 7:30 p.m. PST on Wednesday, the USS Lake Erie fired a single Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) that intercepted the satellite some 130 nautical miles above the Pacific Ocean--a relatively low altitude, the Pentagon said.
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- In terms of chemistry
- After the warhead goes off, there still ought to be plenty of unused oxizer in the area for at least some of the hydrazine to react with.
Let's see -- 1000 pounds. Ignore the difference in wei... (Read the rest) - Posted by: Water Slosher Posted on: 02/23/08 You are currently: Logged In | Log out
 safely ignited in space? bmeacham98@... | 02/21/08 |
  Well... zkiwi | 02/21/08 |
 doesn't combustion = explosion? kspear@... | 02/22/08 |
| In terms of chemistry Water Slosher | 02/23/08 |
| RE: (Photos: Missile shoots down falling satellite) okn916@... | 02/22/08 |
| re: nothing to push against? cppsolutions | 02/22/08 |
| Limiting okn916@... | 02/23/08 |
| shorter answer frylock | 02/22/08 |
| exlposion <> combustion frylock | 02/22/08 |
| RE: (Photos: Missile shoots down falling satellite) daffydaz@... | 02/22/08 |
What do you think?
