Iridium Saved By the US Dept of Defense

mccready was one of quite a bunch of people to send us the news trinket from CNNfn . It seems that the on-again, off-again Iridium system has at least another two years. The US Department of Defense has stepped in with $72 million, while another buyer is found. The reason? To avoid 'triggering possible "widespread anxiety" on re-entry.'

This is probably a good idea...

In a moment of drunken weakness, my ex-girlfriend and I allowed a burning, premature "re-entry". In retrospect, it has triggered quite a bit of anxiety in both of us.


If you're not wasted, the day is.

Re:Iridium the Cat

"Is it just me, or does Iridium have more lives than a cat? I mean, hey, being slated for destruction two, or even three, times is one thing, but when even the US DoD steps in to take up the slack, you've got to wonder if those satellites are ever coming down."

I tracked a lot of the Iridium financial and PR stuff in the early days (several evil MBA projects ). Buried pretty deep in this info was the fact that the US Department of Defense was either a large potential customer, or a large actual customer but the details were secret. I have been wondering for a while if we would see something like this - it seems pretty clear now that DoD is making use of this system and doesn't want to give it up. Interesting.

sPh

That's their story...

and they're sticking to it:

Mercury News report [mercurycenter.com]

: FEAR OF PUBLIC OUTCRY CITED: Despite the relatively small risk, an interagency group led by the Justice Department was ``extremely unhappy at the prospect of a 14-month mass de-orbit,'' a background paper handed out at the Pentagon said. ``The group worried that this might create widespread anxiety and lead to a public outcry for ill-considered government action,'' the document said.

The Pentagon got a global phone system real cheap. They can encrypt all their transmissions, with add-ons or Iridium's existing feature set, and they have unlimited (well, up to the capacity anyway) use of the thing. Plus all the relationships with the local PTTs are toast, so they don't have to worry about China Telecom controlling them when the Green Berets are roaming around Tibet. Sounds like a great deal for the taxpayer!

Iridium in Embassies

I was at the US embassy [state.gov] in New Zealand for a few months about a year ago, and I recall both the Ambassador [state.gov] and the Deputy Chief of Mission received spiffy new Iridium handsets [motorola.com] (follow the link; it cracks me up that the antennas, which were monstrous, are conviently not shown).

I think it was a great idea: Unclassified but Sensitive information could be phoned back to the US without high level personel having to locate a STU [tscm.com] (secure telephone unit). Bypass landlines and possible wiretaps, and you can call from anywhere. I believe conversations from the handset to the satellite were encrypted, so it was a great investment. Of course, the Iridium shut down around 6 months later and the phones were useless...

For better and more info

http://spacedaily.com/news/iridium-00g.html [spacedaily.com]

Sounds like a smokescreen to me.

What's preventing the DoD from turning around, twiddiling a few bits, and cranking out a few radios, and have a nice, nifty, neat, new "not quite military quality" comms channel? Makes sense to me. --Reality is for people who can't handle drugs.

Re-Entry Day

What the DoD should do is spend all that money on a big parade to celebrate the Iridium re-entry into orbit. As the pieces enter the atmosphere everyone can watch them burn up like fireworks and celebrate in techno-pagan style a la "Max Headroom" [imdb.com]. All this new technology, we need to get on the ball making up new holidays, and Science Fiction has showed us enough examples that we should get on that already!

Anxiety?

What about the anxiety of wasting $72,000,000 tax dollars to satisify the minds of those who have watched a few too many made-for-television 'Asteroid' movies?
---
seumas.com

Re:Anxiety?

In general I'm not a fan of conspiracy theories, but I find it difficult to believe the Pentagon would throw in $72M unless they had some so-far-undisclosed interest in Iridium's orbital components.

For example the Galactic Radiation and Background satellite, launched in 1960, carried a second set of hardware to perform signals surveillance of the Soviet Union; this function was not made public until 1968. See http://www.physicstoday.org/pt/vol-53/iss-12/p51.h tml

Iridium the Cat

Is it just me, or does Iridium have more lives than a cat? I mean, hey, being slated for destruction two, or even three, times is one thing, but when even the US DoD steps in to take up the slack, you've got to wonder if those satellites are ever coming down.

If I were a conspiracy theorist, I'd say that the Iridium project was actually an integral part of the new global monitoring system the US uses to track late model vehicles and toothpaste choices. At least then I would have a reason for the invulnerability of the Iridium system.

As it stands, I can only assume that it's the aliens that have kept Iridium flying so the astronomers can't see them. It wasn't a design fluke that the satellites wreak havoc on astronomers; the aliens got tired of hiding behind the moon, so they set up Iridium so they can take field trips around the earth.

You know, on the other hand, perhaps it's just an annoying thing that just won't die... kind of like Windows (or FORTRAN), I guess.

Heh

I bet Reagan called this one in. Now he can finally have that Star Wars Defense System that he always wanted...as soon as they enable the hidden laser grid on the birds.

Re:Iridium and corporate BS

You had better learn about orbital mechanics before you speak.

The Iridium satelites are in what is called "low earth orbit". This means that they are actually flying through an extremely thin part of the Earth's athmosphere. Eventually the orbit decays (over a period of many years) due to the friction of the satelite hitting the molecules of air and the satelite will re-enter the athmosphere.
By doing a controlled re-entry they can control where the satelite will actually enter the athmosphere and hit the (hopefully) water.

real rationale

The sum of 72 million US dollars is a small investment compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars which the DoD has already invested in developing technologies based on Iridium. Since the inception of the project, the DoD has been developing communications systems based on Iridium. Now that they are ready to field them, the plan is to destroy the satellites. D'oh! When the announcement to destroy the satellites was made last spring, I asked one of the DoD's communications planners (forgive me if I obfuscate the actual identity) if the DoD could buy Iridium to protect their investment. According to this fellow, this would require renegotiating a maze of international agreements made for Iridium. It's one thing for a country to negotiate a deal with a private corporation. It's quite another thing to make the same deal with the US Department of Defense! The DoD is simiply attempting to buy extra time for Iridium before eating the loss.