Slashdot Mirror
ISS Can Now Watch Sea Traffic From Space
gyrogeerloose writes "During its last mission, astronauts from the Space Shuttle Atlantis installed an Automatic Identification System antenna on the outside of the International Space Station that will allow astronauts aboard the ISS to monitor signals from the AIS transmitters mandated to be installed on most large ocean-going craft. Although these VHF signals can be monitored from the Earth's surface, their horizontal range is generally limited to about 75 km (46 mi), leaving large areas of the ocean unwatched. However, the signals easily reach the 400 km (250 mi) orbit of the ISS. The European Space Agency sees this experiment as a test platform for a future AIS-monitoring fleet of satellites that will eventually provide worldwide coverage of sea traffic."
How long before I get pulled over for speeding in the trade lanes?
Yes, because pirates always follow regulation and install a AIS transmitters in their "large ocean-going craft"
There are several websites that show at least coastal traffic of all AIS equipped vessels. I like http://www.marinetraffic.com/ais/
He is gonna be HUGE.
Here's the map of existing coverage. The continental US, Europe, and Japan, have full coastal coverage. The port coasts of China and Australia are covered. Beyond that, not so much.
This isn't a safety system. It's for traffic and port management. Vessels show up in the system around the time when ports need to start thinking about where to put them.
Anyone knows what are the advantages of using ISS for this kind of test? I would be interested to see what it costs to send such an antenna up with the shuttle, test that it does not interfere with the rest of the station and train an astronaut to fix it to the exterior, versus just slapping it as secondary payload on some other satellite or even some dedicated micro-satellite that is piggybacking on the launch of a bigger one.
karma police: arrest this man, he talks in maths; he buzzes like a fridge, he's like a detuned radio. [radiohead]
They're already watching sea traffic from space. What this does is allow them to quickly remove "legitimate" traffic from the database so they can focus on traffic that's antithetical to the Empire.
"Is this Winkhorst a nova criminal?" "No just a technical sergeant wanted for interrogation."
When your kids, in their rubber big sea going rubber toy rafts, see pirates / pedophiles, they can press the dolphin button, and get directly connected to an officer with the coast guard.
You're absolutely correct that the mujahedeen (or however you spell that) in Afghanistan were bankrolled and given weapons by the CIA, and bin Laden's contacts within that organization became al Qaeda, and so the West definitely deserves some blame for that. However, there's no particular reason to believe that the CIA had any ongoing interest in any of them once the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan. There's certainly no evidence and no reason to believe that they actually helped plan or carry out 9/11.
The major problem with the idea that the US government had anything to do with 9/11 is that there's no credible evidence of it and there's no reason to believe their assistance would have been required to carry it out. At the heart of it, the 9/11 attack was supremely unsophisticated. All the hijackers needed was some box cutters and plane tickets, and training to fly a plane. All of these things are widely available, and anybody could have done it. The fact is, it's quite easy to believe some dude in a cave could have planned and carried it out, especially when that dude in a cave happens to be as wealthy as Osama bin Laden, heir to the bin Laden construction fortune.
I know none of that is convincing to conspiracy buffs, but the fact is a perfectly simple and plausible explanation for the event exists that requires no massive conspiracies: a highly motivated group of people did something that anyone could have done with a little time and a few thousand dollars.