Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Sleek, Sexy Spacecraft to Launch Next Week

GOCE: Spacecraft of the future is here! Credit: ESA

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This has to be the sexiest looking spacecraft ever built by humankind. No, it’s not a starship or battle cruiser (although it does look a little like the Eagle spacecraft from the old television show Space: 1999). This sleek, slender, sexy, shiny and sophisticated spacecraft is an Earth-orbiting satellite that will investigate our planet’s gravitational field and map the reference shape of our planet – the geoid – with unprecedented resolution and accuracy. GOCE, or the Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer is scheduled to launch on Wed. September 10 at 16:21 CEST (14:21 UTC). Why such a sleek design? As GOCE Systems Manager Michael Fehringer says, “Form follows function not only in the world of fashion! To fly low and avoid air drag, the best shape for the satellite to be is long, slender and absolutely symmetrical along the direction of flight.”

ESA’s 1 ton, 5 meter-long spacecraft will be in an extra low orbit (260 km, or 161 miles) and will experience drag from Earth’s upper atmosphere, so smooth and lean helps reduce the friction. Adding to the sleek design is that the solar panels are attached to the long body of the satellite instead of sticking out clumsily and adding to the drag. ESA has a great animation of GOCE in flight. Although the design will help, the spacecraft will need a boost to its orbit occasionally, and has state of the art ion engines.

GOCE on the launchpad. Credit: ESA
GOCE on the launchpad. Credit: ESA

GOCE will be in a sun-synchronous orbit, meaning it will be almost always be in sunlight, providing a stable thermal environment for the spacecraft.

The instruments are all placed along the axis of the satellite’s body, adding to its sleekness — check out this great animation. GOCE carries a set of six state-of-the-art high-sensitivity accelerometers to measure the components of the gravity field along all three axes. The data collected will provide a high-resolution map of the geoid and of gravitational anomalies. This will greatly improve our knowledge and understanding of the Earth’s internal structure, and will be used as a much-improved reference for ocean and climate studies, including sea-level changes, oceanic circulation and ice caps dynamics survey. Numerous applications are expected in climatology, oceanography and geophysics, as well as for geodetic and positioning activities.

Here’s an interactive feature to take a closer look at the spacecraft.

Oooo. It’s enough to make a girl purr.

Source: ESA
Also, check out Ian’s article on Astroengine

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

GLAST Science Operations Underway: Now, About That Name!

Artists impression of GLAST in orbit. Credit: NASA

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After a 60-day checkout period, science operations have begun in earnest for GLAST, the Gamma ray Large Area Space Telescope, which is now surveying the gamma-ray sky. Launched on June 11, 2008, the GLAST spacecraft has been undergoing calibrations of the two instruments on board, the LAT (Large Area Telescope) and the GBM (GLAST Burst Monitor) — more details on the instruments in a moment. But during the checkout phase both instruments made significant observations of gamma rays. “Given that these detections were made with just the engineering data observations, the future is full of promise, and we are very excited,” said Dr. Steve Ritz, GLAST Project Scientist in his GLAST blog. At the end of August, there will be a formal release of the first-light images taken by the spacecraft. Also at that time, NASA will rename the observatory. I don’t know about you, but I’m sort of attached to the name “GLAST.” But it will be interesting to find out its new, official name.

In June, LAT detected two extraordinarily bright, flaring sources in space, which scientists believe are very likely supermassive black hole systems at the cores of active galaxies, located far across the universe, but incredibly bright. Additionally, by the end of July, the GBM had detected 12 gamma ray bursts.

“We are thrilled to be detecting gamma-ray bursts so early in the mission. GLAST and the GBM are off to a great start!” said Charles “Chip” Meegan, GBM principal investigator at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. “The detectors are working well and we’re really pleased with how the instrument is working. That said, we’re using this checkout period to scrutinize the data coming down from the detectors and fine tune flight and ground software and our daily operational processes.”

GRBs detected by GLAST. Credit: NASA
GRBs detected by GLAST. Credit: NASA

The LAT detects gamma rays and is able to make gamma ray images of astronomical objects. The GBM is designed to observe gamma ray bursts, which are sudden, brief flashes of gamma rays that occur about once a day at random positions in the sky. The GBM has such a large field-of-view that it will be able to see bursts from over 2/3 of the sky at one time. The observations made by GBM were verified by the Swift Telescope, another space telescope that can swiftly skew around to view a gamma ray burst.

NASA has a tradition of renaming spacecraft after a successful launch, and with GLAST they decided to wait until the “first light” images are released. Any guesses on what the new name will be?

Source: GLAST blog

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

From Space to the Olympics

Fireworks at the 2008 Olympics Opening Ceremony. Credit: Clive Rose, Getty Images

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Space and the Olympics might not be synonymous in most people’s minds — although this image of the Opening Ceremony fireworks makes it look like Olympic Stadium is going supernova — but there are a few connections between the two for this year’s Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. Google Earth recently updated the satellite imagery it uses for the Beijing area to provide users with better maps. They also used satellite imagery to create a 3-D tour of all the facilities for the 2008 Olympics (see video below). Other space connections include several space explorers who carried the Olympic torch on its running tour around the world, and NASA space spinoff technology used in some of the clothing and equipment for Olympic use.

Valentina Tereshkova carrying Olympic torch. Credit: Xinhua via CollectSpace

The first woman in space, Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, one of 80 Russian runners, carried the Olympic torch during its tour of that country in early April. Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor, the first Malaysian in space, ran with the torch along the top of Kuala Lumpur Tower on April 21, just six months after his visit as a “spaceflight participant” to in International Space Station. Fittingly, several Chinese taikonauts carried the torch: Fei Junlong and Nie Haisheng, the two-man crew from China’s second spaceflight, Shenzou 6 ran with the torch when it arrived in China in May. China’s first space explorer, Yang Liwei who flew solo on Shenzou 5 in 2003, carried the torch when it first arrived in Beijing on August 6.

While no US astronauts carried the torch, NASA astronaut Scott Parazynski was at Base Camp when Chinese climbers carried the torch to the summit of Mt. Everest on May 8.

NASA developed “riblet” technology to aid in the aerodynamic properties of airplanes. Riblets are V-shaped grooves with angles that point in the direction of the air flow. They are no bigger than a scratch, and they look like very tiny ribs. Riblets help reduce “skin-friction” drag. But it also helps reduce friction from water, and riblets have been used in rowing shells in the four-oar-with-coxswain category. Swimsuits with riblets have also been used in competition at the Pan American games.

The shoes from space. Credit: NASA

And of course, everyone is probably familiar with the lore that today’s athletic shoes use the same cushioning technology that was developed for the moon boots used in the Apollo missions to the moon.

News Sources: Collect Space, Kodak Olympic Picture of the Day, NASA Goes to the Olympics

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Nano-materials Could Protect Spacecraft and Satellites From Debris

Space junk in Earth orbit is becoming a big problem (here’s an previous UT article that illustrates the problem.) If the International Space Station or an operating communications or science satellite were struck by debris such as an old satellite, launch vehicle parts, or even something as small as a paint chip, it could mean disaster. Space debris also threatens the lives of astronauts and the launch of new satellites today, says Dr. Noam Eliaz, Head of the Biomaterials and Corrosion Laboratory at the School of Mechanical Engineering at Tel Aviv University. An expert in materials science and engineering, Dr. Eliaz is working to create and test new nano-materials and polymers to protect satellites and astronauts alike.

Eliaz is developing nano-based materials with special mechanical properties, such as high strength and wear resistance, and controllable electrical and thermal properties. “This could lead to a superior material for the external blankets of spacecraft,” says Eliaz. Some of the materials Eliaz has researched are being used by biomedical device companies and by aircraft industries worldwide.

One candidate Eliaz and his colleagues have investigated is a hybrid nano-material which incorporates small silicon-containing cages that can open and react with atomic oxygen to prevent further polymer degradation. Basically, a silicon skin would form to “patch” a puncture caused by a debris hit.

The team has also conducted space durability studies on polymers developed by the U.S. Air Force and Hybrid Plastics Inc, and the results are being reviewed by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA). “Our simulation studies were done on Earth to determine how space debris will impact new polymers developed to protect space vehicles,” says Dr. Eliaz.

Original News Source: American Friends of Tel Aviv University

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Wind Power From the Ocean (With Help from Space)

I drive regularly through Iowa and southern Minnesota in the US, and over the past few years wind farms have been popping up in that region up almost faster than corn grows. These massive wind turbines are awesome to see. But there may be an even better location for future wind farms than the breezy plains of the central United States: our oceans. Experts say ocean winds blow harder and with more reliable consistency than wind on land, which more than offsets the greater cost of building windmills offshore. Efforts to harness the energy potential of Earth’s ocean winds could soon gain an important new tool: global satellite maps from NASA. Scientists have been creating maps using nearly a decade of data from NASA’s QuikSCAT satellite that reveal ocean areas where winds could produce wind energy.

“Wind energy is environmentally friendly. After the initial energy investment to build and install wind turbines, you don’t burn fossil fuels that emit carbon,” said study lead author Tim Liu, a senior research scientist and QuikSCAT science team leader at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “Like solar power, wind energy is green energy.”

The new maps created by QuickSCAT have many potential uses including planning the location of offshore wind farms to convert wind energy into electric energy. Ocean wind farms have less environmental impact than onshore wind farms, whose noise tends to disturb sensitive wildlife in their immediate area.

QuikSCAT, launched in 1999, tracks the speed, direction and power of winds near the ocean surface. Data from QuikSCAT, collected continuously by a specialized microwave radar instrument named SeaWinds, also are used to predict storms and enhance the accuracy of weather forecasts.

Wind energy has the potential to provide 10 to 15 percent of future world energy requirements, according to Paul Dimotakis, chief technologist at JPL. If ocean areas with high winds were tapped for wind energy, they could potentially generate 500 to 800 watts of energy per square meter, according to Liu’s research. Dimotakis notes that while this is slightly less than solar energy (which generates about one kilowatt of energy per square meter), wind power can be converted to electricity more efficiently than solar energy and at a lower cost per watt of electricity produced.

The new QuikSCAT maps, which add to previous generations of QuikSCAT wind atlases, also will be beneficial to the shipping industry by highlighting areas of the ocean where high winds could be hazardous to ships, allowing them to steer clear of these areas.

Scientists use the QuikSCAT data to examine how ocean winds affect weather and climate, by driving ocean currents, mixing ocean waters, and affecting the carbon, heat and water interaction between the ocean and the atmosphere.

News Source: NASA

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

The Yin and Yang of the NeXT Spacecraft

Hard and soft. Dark and bright. High and low. Wide and thin. JAXA and NASA. And that’s just one spacecraft. Japan’s space agency, JAXA and NASA are teaming up to create a new spacecraft to study the extreme environments of the universe. NeXT, which stands for New exploration X-Ray Telescope is a next generation x-ray astronomy satellite currently under development, with launch scheduled in 2013. While Japan will provide the main spacecraft and several instruments, NASA, and in particular the Goddard Space Flight Center just announced they will be adding a new instrument to the spacecraft, the High-Resolution Soft X-Ray Spectrometer (SXS). While the spacecraft’s main instrument will be its Hard X-ray Telescope (HXTs) the addition of SXS is just one of several complementary instruments that provide a “yin and yang” aspect to NeXT’s explorations, which hope to reveal new facets of the universe.

The concept of yin and yang involves two opposing, but at the same time, complementary aspects of any one phenomenon, or comparison of any two phenomena. NeXT will employ both those aspects. With the addition of NASA’s SXS, NeXT will be observing both so-called “hard” and “soft” x-rays. Hard x-rays are the highest energy x-rays, typically having energies greater than 10,000 electron volts (or 10 keV) while the lower energy x-rays are referred to as soft x-rays, which have less energy and longer wavelengths. Different types of instruments are needed to detect each kind.

Conventional X-ray mirrors usually can just concentrate on only soft X-rays up to 10 keV. NeXT’s HXTs will use a “super mirror” which has a multi-layer coating on the reflecting surface in order to observe hard X-rays. The mission designers plan to utilize this technique to extend the energy band of the X-ray mirrors by nearly an order of magnitude. Observation of hard X-rays will enable the study of the various acceleration phenomena in the universe, such as dark energy, cosmic rays and supernova remnants, which astronomers say can never be completely understood through the observations of the thermal phenomena below 10 keV.

We have known for some time that cosmic X-rays are accelerated by supernova remnants. But some cosmic X-rays have energy levels so high that they cannot possibly come from a supernova remnant. These high-energy or hard cosmic X-rays may have been created when galaxy clusters evolved. According to this theory, when the galaxy clusters, which were small at first, were colliding and merging into large ones, shock waves were created, which greatly accelerated the particles. NeXT, may confirm or refute this theory.

NeXT will have both a soft x-ray telescope and soft x-ray spectrometer. With these instruments, the spacecraft can investigate the nature of dark matter on large scales in the universe, and can also explore how bright galaxies and clusters of galaxies form and evolve.

“We are thrilled to have the opportunity to create a powerful new x-ray spectrometer that will open up a whole new realm in high energy astrophysics in collaboration with our partners in Japan,” said Richard L. Kelley, the Principal Investigator for the SXS mission at Goddard. We have a great team in place that is anxiously waiting to start work.”

To compliment the x-ray telescopes there will also be Wide-band X-ray Imagers (WXI) to cover a wide energy range. Because it is difficult to cover such a wide energy range with a single detector, NeXT will use a hybrid detector, which consists of an upper-stage, soft X-ray detector and a lower-stage, hard X-ray detector. It will use thinned X-ray CCDs (charged coupled devices) for the upper stage, which stop only the soft X-rays and and a CdTe (cadmium telluride) pixel detector for the lower stage.

Also in the suite of instruments is a Soft Gamma-ray detector (SGD), which is still under development. It will include an ultra-low background, high-sensitivity detector in soft gamma-ray band by combining an active shield and an pixel detector.

Charles Gay, deputy associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington said missions like SXS and NeXT “expand NASA’s science through partnerships with international and commercial organizations,” – just another complimentary aspect of a mission full of yin and yang.

Original News Source: NASA,

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

STEREO Maps Far Reaches of Solar System

NASA’s twin STEREO spacecraft have been studying the sun since their launch in 2006. But the mission made a surprising and unexpected discovery by detecting particles from the edge of the solar system, and for the first time, scientists have now been able to map the region where the hot solar wind meets up with the cold interstellar medium. However, this wasn’t done with optical instruments imaging in visible light, but by mapping the region by means of neutral, or uncharged, atoms. This breakthrough is a “new kind of astronomy using neutral atoms,” said Robert Lin, from the University of California Berkeley, and lead for the suprathermal electron sensor aboard STEREO. “You can’t get a global picture of this region, one of the last unexplored regions of the heliosphere, any other way because it is too tenuous to be seen by normal optical telescopes.” The findings also help clear up a discrepancy in the amount of energy in the region found by the Voyager 2 spacecraft as it passed through the edge of the solar system last year.

The heliosphere stretches from the sun to more than twice the distance of Pluto. Beyond its edge, called the heliopause, lies the relative quiet of interstellar space, at about 100 astronomical units (AU) – 100 times the Earth-sun distance. The termination shock is the region of the heliosphere where the supersonic solar wind slows to subsonic speed as it merges with the interstellar medium. The heliosheath is the region of churning plasma between the shock front and the interstellar medium.

The twin STEREO spacecraft, in Earth’s orbit about the sun, take stereo pictures of the sun’s surface and measure magnetic fields and ion fluxes associated with solar explosions.

Between June and October 2007, however, the suprathermal electron sensor in the IMPACT (In-situ Measurements of Particles and CME Transients) suite of instruments on board each STEREO spacecraft detected neutral atoms originating from both the shock front and the heliosheath beyond.

“The suprathermal electron sensors were designed to detect charged electrons, which fluctuate in intensity depending on the magnetic field,” said lead author Linghua Wang, a graduate student in UC Berkeley’s Department of Physics. “We were surprised that these particle intensities didn’t depend on the magnetic field, which meant they must be neutral atoms.”

UC Berkeley physicists concluded that these energetic neutral atoms were originally ions heated up in the termination that lost their charge to cold atoms in the interstellar medium and, no longer hindered by magnetic fields, flowed back toward the sun and into the suprathermal electron sensors on STEREO.

“This is the first mapping of energetic neutral particles from beyond the heliosphere,” Lin said. “These neutral atoms tell us about the hot ions in the heliosheath. The ions heated in the termination shock exchange charge with the cold, neutral atoms in the interstellar medium to become neutral, and then flow back in.”

According to Lin, the neutral atoms are probably hydrogen, since most of the particles in the local interstellar medium are hydrogen.

The findings from STEREO, reported in the July 3 issue of the journal Nature, clear up a discrepancy in the amount of energy dumped into space by the decelerating solar wind that was discovered last year when Voyager 2 crossed the solar system’s termination shock and entered the surrounding heliosheath.

The newly discovered population of ions in the heliosheath contains about 70 percent of the energy dissipated in the termination shock, exactly the amount unaccounted for by Voyager 2’s instruments, the UC Berkeley physicists concluded. The Voyager 2 results are reported in the same issue of Nature.

A new NASA mission, the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX), is planned for launch later this year to map more thoroughly the lower-energy energetic ions in the heliosheath by means of energetic neutral atoms to discover the structure of the termination shock and how hydrogen ions are accelerated there.

Original News Source: EurekAlert

Posted on by Nicholos Wethington

Canada to build World’s First Asteroid-hunting Satellite

Just yesterday (June 30th) was the 100-year anniversary of the Tunguska event, when a small piece of ice or rock exploded in the air near the Podkammenaya Tungus river in Siberia, flattening trees and scaring the heck out of people in the surrounding area. Thankfully, the blast didn’t happen in a populated area and nobody was killed, but there are many more pieces of debris floating around out there in space. If we want to do something about an asteroid headed our way, or keep astronauts safe from space debris, knowing is half the battle. Thanks to a new microsatellite being built by the Canadian Space Agency, we will soon have a better map of the objects surrounding the Earth’s orbit.

The Near Earth Object Surveillance Satellite (NEOSSat) is a small satellite, about the size of a suitcase and weighing 143 pounds (65 kilograms). This puts it in a class of satellites known as “microsatellites”. Canada has already launched a successful microsatellite mission – Microvariability and Oscillation of STars (MOST) – that measured the light oscillation of stars to determine their age.

NEOSSat will monitor asteroids, comets and space junk in near-Earth orbit – within 100 – 1240 miles (160 – 2000 km) – to create a detailed survey of objects close to the Earth. It will also track other satellites, such as geosynchronous satellites, which orbit further out at 22,400 miles (~36,000 km).

NEOSSat wont’ orbit the way many satellites do – around the equator of the Earth – but will rather follow a polar orbit, circling from pole to pole every 50 minutes. This allows it to observe near the Sun where asteroids that orbit uniquely inside the Earth’s orbit are to be found. It will use a sunshade to observe with 45 degrees of the Sun. The polar orbit also gives the spacecraft the ability to use parallax to determine the distance to asteroids, comets and debris

Because of its location outside the Earth’s atmosphere, NEOSSat can also be small – it will use only a 15cm (6 inch) telescope. The small size will make the satellite easy to pack in with another, larger satellite for launch, thus reducing the cost of the mission.

Satellites are much better at making observations because they don’t have to look through the Earth’s thick atmosphere. NEOSSat will provide a huge advantage in surveying the hundreds of thousands of objects surrounding the Earth.

Dr. Alan Hildebrand the Canada Research Chair in Planetary Science in the University of Calgary’s Department of Geoscience said,”NEOSSat being on-orbit will give us terrific skies for observing 24-hours a day, guaranteed. Keeping up with the amount of data streaming back to us will be a challenge, but it will provide us with an unprecedented view of space encompassing Earth’s orbit.”

The mission is funded by as a joint project between the Canadian Space Agency and Defense Research Development Canada.

Source: EurekAlert, NEOSSat

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Solar Sail To Launch This Summer

NanoSail D. Image credit NASA

NASA’s Marshall and Ames Research Centers will team up with the commercial space company SpaceX to launch and deploy a solar sail this summer. A bread-box sized payload called NanoSail-D will travel to space onboard a SpaceX Falcon 1 Rocket and if all goes well, it will be the first fully deployed solar sail in space, and the first spacecraft to use a solar sail as a primary means of orbital maneuvering. The first launch window is from July 29th to August 6th, with a back-up window extending from August 29th to September 5th. Weighing less than 4.5 kilograms (10 pounds) the aluminum and plastic sail has about 9.3 m² (100 square feet) of light-catching surface which researchers hope will successfully propel the spacecraft.

Solar sails have been the stuff of dreams for years. Because there’s no friction in space, once a solar sail starts moving, it can go on forever. While rockets would run out of gas and begin to coast, a spaceship powered by solar sails would continue accelerating as long as there is a solar wind, reaching faster speeds and covering distances far greater than any rocket. No rocket has been invented that could carry enough fuel to reach the outer solar system in as short a time. And like a marine sail, a solar sail could also bring you home. You could use the solar sail to travel “against the wind,” back to Earth.

“It’s not so much about how far a sail will go compared to a rocket; the key is how fast,” says Edward “Sandy” Montgomery of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. “The Voyagers have escaped the solar system, and they were sent by rockets, but it’s taken more than three decades to do it. A sail launched today would probably catch up with them in a single decade. Sails are slower to get started though. So, for example, between the Earth and the moon, rockets might be preferred for missions with a short timeline. It’s a trip of days for rockets, but months for a solar sail. The rule of thumb, therefore, would be to use rockets for short hops and solar sails for the long hauls.”

Previous attempts to launch and deploy a solar sail in space have met limited success. In 2004 Japan launched prototype solar sails that deployed, but they weren’t used for propulsion. The Planetary Society attempted a solar sail launch in 2005, called Cosmos 1, but the Russian launch vehicle failed to reach orbit. NASA did successfully deploy a solar sail in a vacuum chamber in 2004, but of course, its propulsive capability wasn’t able to be tested.

Montgomery believes a successful mission would be huge for the future of spaceflight. If successful, solar sails could potentially help with a growing problem of space debris.

“Currently, micro-satellites in orbit above a few hundred kilometers can stay in orbit for decades after completing their mission,” Montgomery said. “This creates an orbital debris collision risk for other spacecraft. NanoSail-D will demonstrate the feasibility of using a drag sail to decrease the time satellites clutter up Earth’s orbit. Although our sail looks like a kite, it will act like a parachute (or like a drag sail) in the very thin upper atmosphere around Earth. It will slow the spacecraft and make it lose altitude, re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere and burn off in a relatively short period of time. A drag sail is a lighter alternative to carrying a propulsion system to de-orbit a satellite.”

Movie of how NanoSail D will unfurl.

Original News Source: Science at NASA

Posted on by Ian O'Neill

Photographer Images Satellites That Do Not Exist

Two classified satellite trails (Trevor Paglen)

Trevor Paglen is an astrophotographer with a difference… he takes photos of satellites that are not there. Officially “not there“, anyway. He spends many nights surveying the skies, waiting for classified spy satellites to pass overhead. When one appears, after researching what is actually out there (which is a hard task, these things are not meant to be discovered!) he captures it with his hi-tech astronomical spy satellite-catching equipment. His work makes for captivating (if unnerving) reading. Apart from capturing 189 “ghost” satellites in orbit, he’s turned his stargazing lenses to Earth and taken a peek into the top secret world of “black ops”…

In a new art show at the University of California, Berkley (link down at time of writing), it could be any regular astrophotography exhibit. But this one called “The Other Night Sky” is very different. The photographer is Trevor Paglen and he has an interesting pastime; he takes pictures of things the US government wants to keep secret. Firstly, Paglen’s night sky imagery documents 189 US spy satellites he has painstakingly tracked down and captured in a camera shutter to be displayed for public viewing. It’s one thing to sit and wait for the International Space Station to pass overhead (after following its orbit on Google Earth) and take a picture that looks better than a dim blur (much like my attempt at astrophotography!), but it’s quite another thing to do the research on something that shouldn’t exist, predict where the satellite might appear and capture its trail as crisply as Paglen does.

But how does he do this? Firstly, he uses spy satellite data compiled by renowned amateur astronomer Ted Molczan to predict when one of these classified satellites will pass through the night sky. He then sets his equipment up in the region of sky where he hopes the small dot may pass through. Using a computer controlled motor mounted telescope and webcam he focuses on a star and makes sure the shot is correctly composed. Using another, more powerful telescope and camera, he focuses on the same region. When the predicted satellite passes through the sky, he’s able to take a range of shots using the webcam-mount and powerful telescope. He’s collected 1500 images of pictures taken in this way, documenting the 189 satellites on different campaigns.

So far so good. His work may seem a little disconcerting at this point (after all, these are top secret satellites he’s spying on), but he draws a parallel between what he is doing with Galileo’s observations of Jupiter. “What would it mean to find these secret moons in orbit around the earth in the same way that Galileo found these moons that shouldn’t exist in orbit around Jupiter?” Paglen says. What he means is that the Catholic Church in Galileo Galilee’s time forbade any natural satellite to orbit around the gas giant; Galileo was observing something that shouldn’t exist. Paglen appears to be taking an anti-establishment stance himself by observing satellites orbiting the Earth that the establishment denies knowledge of. It’s an interesting concept.

But we haven’t touched on the really sensitive stuff yet. He uses his high-powered optics to look deep into locations on the ground, “restricted areas” within the US; particularly secret military facilities in the Nevada Desert. He uses a method known as “limit-telephotography” applying equipment more commonly used to studying the cosmos. Limit-telephotography is a way of photographing landscapes that cannot be viewed unaided, obviously a useful way of looking deep into restricted areas if there’s a structure in your line of site but obscured by atmospheric aberrations (such as heat haze). When using similar equipment to view distant galaxies, there’s only about 5 miles of obscuring atmosphere to look through, with limit-telephotography there might be over 40 miles of atmosphere to look through.

Whilst Paglen may be taking pictures of top secret locations, and his intent is highly political (he spends a lot of time trying to bring to light various “black operations” throughout the US), most of his imagery probably wouldn’t be too much of a concern to government agencies, but it is a rare peek into a dark world most of us will never fully comprehend…

Source: Wired