The Cold War nuke that fried satellites

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150910-the-nuke-that-fried-satellites-with-terrifying-results

by Audiophilip • 11 years ago

35 16 11 years ago

British government documents detailing the fate of the satellite remained locked away for 50 years. Reading through a copy of the file stamped ‘secret’ in red letters today, it is clear why: Nasa realised almost immediately what had happened to the satellite but the UK was, embarrassingly, kept in the dark.

Another example of Classification used to censor something that poses no security risk, but holds huge reputation risk.

dx211• 11 years ago

You say that, but now that this is out it's only a matter of time before the bad guys realize they can stop using their nukes for leveling cities and repurpose them for disrupting HBO.

Finster• 11 years ago

Except not, because satellites are now hardened against this kind of radiation as a side effect of hardening against cosmic rays, etc.

source: the article

sandworm1014• 11 years ago

The sats for HBO are geostationary. Hitting them with nukes is a far cry from disrupting those in low orbits. You would need a much bigger rocket and significantly better aim (GST=35000km vs. LEO=150km).

sandworm1014• 11 years ago

I don't think it was kept secret to diminish embarrassment or save face. The impact on satellites was an outcome of the test. It was part of the weapon's overall effectiveness. How well your weapons work on specific targets, even those outside the test area, is exactly the type of information you try to keep out of enemy hands.

stephengillie2• 11 years ago

But the UK and US have been allies for a very long time...

smileysteve• 11 years ago

Is this the real life event that led to Goldeneye?

sergiotapia• 11 years ago

For England, James?

doctorshady• 11 years ago

No - for me.

krylon3• 11 years ago

If I recall correctly, there were a couple of people (I don't remember if they were astronauts or cosmonauts) in orbit at the time of Starfish Prime, whose space capsule passed through the radiation belt on its orbit. The space agency in question was pretty nervous about them getting fried as well, and was kind of upset they weren't informed ahead of time.

sandworm1014• 11 years ago

I doubt it. The vanallen belts were predicted long ahead of time and were confirmed during the very first sat missions (explorer 1). They were known not to be dangerous, at least not in comparison to riding a rocket. The amount of dangerous radiation penetrating any spacecraft would be minimal in comparison to that constantly funneled into the belt from space.

The vanallen belts are often mentioned by moon hoax people to suggest that manned spaceflight is impossible. Mr Van Allan has been interviewed several times to dispute this assertion.

krylon3• 11 years ago

As far as I understand the issue, the Van Allen belts themselves were not the problem, but the high energy electrons released by the thermonuclear explosion, which got caught in the belt. (Apparently the amount of high energy particles released during a solar mass ejection far exceeds that released by any of the nuclear weapons set off during Operation Fishbowl, but I guess people knew a lot less about SMEs back then.)

The only reference I can find right now is the Wikipedia article on "High altitude nuclear explosion", which says: "The radiation dose rate was at least 60 rads/day at four months after Starfish for a well-shielded satellite or manned capsule in a polar circular earth orbit, which caused NASA concern with regard to its manned space exploration programs."

Which sounds quite a bit less dramatic than I remembered.

pvg• 11 years ago

I don't think there were any. Starfish Prime was on July 9th, 1962, with Mercury-Atlas 7 launching on May 24, 1962 and lasting 4 hours followed by Vostok 3 launching August 11th, same year. Take a look at:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_human_spaceflights#Det...

krylon3• 11 years ago

You are right. Looks like my memory is not what it used to be.

jawbone3• 11 years ago

Many good reasons for protect space from weaponization by treaty, too bad the article doesn't raise this issue better.

The Cold War nuke that fried satellites

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