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The US Has Destroyed A Critical Sea Ice-Measuring Satellite (scientificamerican.com)
"A key polar satellite used to measure the Arctic ice cap failed a few days ago, leaving the U.S. with only three others, and those have lived well beyond their shelf lives," writes long-time Slashdot reader edibobb. The Guardian reports that all three of the remaining satellites "are all beginning to drift out of their orbits over the poles" and will no longer be operational by 2023. This could put an end to nearly 40 years of uninterrupted data on polar ice, notes the original submission, adding "It seems like there would be a backup satellite, right?
"In fact, there was a backup satellite ready to go." The $58 million satellite was dismantled in 2016 when the Republican-controlled Congress cut its funding. (The Guardian reports that many scientists "say this decision was made for purely ideological reasons.") Now Nature reports: The U.S. military is developing another set of weather satellites...but the one carrying a microwave sensor will not launch before 2022. That means that when the current three aging satellites die, the United States will be without a reliable, long-term source of sea-ice data... For now, the the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center is preparing for those scenarios by incorporating data from Japan's AMSR2 microwave sensor into its sea-ice record. Another, more politically fraught option is to pull in data from the China Meteorological Administration's Fengyun satellite series... Since 2011 Congress has banned NASA scientists from working with Chinese scientists -- but not necessarily from using Chinese data. One final possibility is finding a way to launch the passive-microwave sensor that scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory salvaged from the dismantled DMSP satellite. The sensor currently sits at the Aerospace Corporation in El Segundo, California, where researchers are trying to find a way to get it into orbit.
"In fact, there was a backup satellite ready to go." The $58 million satellite was dismantled in 2016 when the Republican-controlled Congress cut its funding. (The Guardian reports that many scientists "say this decision was made for purely ideological reasons.") Now Nature reports: The U.S. military is developing another set of weather satellites...but the one carrying a microwave sensor will not launch before 2022. That means that when the current three aging satellites die, the United States will be without a reliable, long-term source of sea-ice data... For now, the the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center is preparing for those scenarios by incorporating data from Japan's AMSR2 microwave sensor into its sea-ice record. Another, more politically fraught option is to pull in data from the China Meteorological Administration's Fengyun satellite series... Since 2011 Congress has banned NASA scientists from working with Chinese scientists -- but not necessarily from using Chinese data. One final possibility is finding a way to launch the passive-microwave sensor that scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory salvaged from the dismantled DMSP satellite. The sensor currently sits at the Aerospace Corporation in El Segundo, California, where researchers are trying to find a way to get it into orbit.
The science of climate change is already settled. The only question is how bad will it be. Without data from this satalite we should just assume the worst and raise carbon taxes appropriately. What is the worst the could happen, we accidentally end up with a better world?
So one failed, three more are failing and one had its funding cut. Where's the destroyed one of the headline?
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
They destroyed the backup one that should have been launched to replace the one that failed.
The headline is talking about the backup satellite that was dismantled...
I assume they're talking about this:
"In fact, there was a backup satellite ready to go." The $58 million satellite was dismantled in 2016 when the Republican-controlled Congress cut its funding."
the one that had its funding cut.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Still, it's a pretty inflammatory and misleading title. While dismantling the satellite may have been shortsighted the article title makes it sound like we blew it up or something like a bunch of drunken hillbillies. In reality its parts were probably just re purposed or put in storage or something.
it literally says it was scrapped.
and that the funding was cut for partisan (ie, GOP science denying) reasons.
the headline isn't inflammatory.
its completely accurate.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
The US are not the only country to put things in space.
Japan, Europe and China also have appropriate satellites, as mentioned in the article. It is not like measurements will stop just because the US lost some satellites. It may make exploitation a bit more difficult because of the differences in design but aggregating data is something that has to be done eventually. Climate science is an international matter.
The US plans to launch new satellites in a few years anyways. So they didn't drop the ball entirely.
The spin on the story suggests Congress purposely cut funding to that satellite for ideological reasons (in the opinion of 'many' scientists). Go to the link and it becomes clear that the program had been very poorly managed and half a billion had been spent on the satellite PLUS the manager (the Air Force) is already working on follow-on programs.
So really what was the intent of this post? To make it seem like this was part of a Republican anti-science/climate change denial effort?
Actually the story should be: under the previous administration the Air Force was permitted to mismanage a publicly funded project to the tune of +$500 million dollars and finally Congress stopped the pouring of more money in to the project.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
The backup one that they dismantled was "destroyed", in the sense that it no longer exists.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
So the existing satellites go out of service in 2023, and the Air Force satellite will go up in 2022.
How does this equate to "we will no longer have the ability to measure sea ice?"
when this could at least be contracted out to someone
It was. Lockheed built the satellite.
At our office we scrap things all the time. That doesn't mean we destroy it.
Yeah but the US dismantled that satellite, which does mean it destroyed it.
I know, right? Speaking as another Internet commentator who has no understanding of satellite design, I also assume that there must be a very low cost alternative that would work just as well. I once built a rocket using a soda bottle, baking soda, and vinegar. How hard could it be?
Please learn to read the full article - after the funding was lost, the satellite that was ready to be launched, was scrapped. In the process it was dismantled and some useful parts, salvaged, but the satellite that was to be a replacement for the failing ones, is GONE! DISMANTLED - DISASSEMBLED! In other words destroyed.
Europe launched the Cryosat-2 satellite in 2010.
Problem is that different satellites use different types of sensors, which can make it harder to compare the results from one satellite to the other. And when you calibrate the output from one to match the other, people will blame scientists for "adjusting" the data.
No more of these expensive satellites! Free market rules tell us we'll get our weather information from the Weather Channel just like everyone else.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
The summary references the salvaged sensor off of the "destroyed" satellite. So, no, at least some of the parts still exist. They are in the process of designing and launching replacement satellites - my guess is they will move up the launch date of the one with a microwave sensor if the 3 in orbit all were to fail.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
This other nonsense
...has nothing to do with satellites.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
At our office we scrap things all the time. That doesn't mean we destroy it. We usually put it into storage in case it ever gets revived.
In this particular case, reading the actual article (and not just the summary), the U.S. Congress was annoyed at the money spent on keeping the satellilte in storage, and had it destroyed. So, no, in this case, scrapped did mean destroyed.
Reading the old articles, though, nobody was discussing sea ice, which is just one of the least important things the satellite was to measure-- primarily it was a Defense weather satellite (weather turns out to be very important to the Department of Defence-- particularly to the Navy. Who knew?)
Except that the satellite _WAS_ dismantled and its microwave sensor is now somewhere in south america.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
I scraped equipment (mostly computers) all the time as well. The process generally involved breaking it down to it's base components (talking hard drives, video cards, ram, etc. Not capacitors, resistors, circuit boards) and throwing the parts in a bin/on a shelf somewhere. After a while the bins get thrown out and the stuff on the shelves gets cannibalized for other PCs. Now, could I go back and re-assemble those computers? Sure, but not likely with the original components. That's probably fine for a PC, probably not fine for a satellite. Sounds pretty "destroyed" to me.
His response was entirely snark but you seem to be treating it seriously.
I'm not sure how much knowledge you have of engineering or aerospace science, but people need funding and time to come up with cost saving measures. If Congress had given NASA funding and a directive to shrink their weather satellites, that would have allowed them to still meet the launch date, then it would have happened. Cutting funding for the project entirely is not going to achieve the result you desire. I only briefly worked in aerospace but all of my engineering projects have involved balancing cost savings, resources and deadlines.
Did Space-X significantly lower launch costs for the U.S. Government? Yes. Did they have a ton of money and time with that singular purpose in mind? Yes. Was Russia already providing significantly cheaper launch services? Yes, through assembly line scaling, which means building the exact same thing over and over. I bring up that last bit because some /.s are complaining that the scrapped satellite was unoriginal, but that's how you save costs in manufacturing, by making the same exact thing several times.
Think globally but act within local variable scope.
The US destroyed it?
Actually, according to the summary, it wasn't the US that destroyed it, but specifically Republicans that destroyed it (probably cackling with delight while they enjoyed another helping of boiled puppy).
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
It's easier to show that you've done the job right if the data is the same. The best strategy is to launch a backup satellite before the old one dies, so you have a window of overlap, and can verify that all the data matches.
Really Slashdot? Headline hardly does justice to the complexity and thought of the issue found within the linked article. 1800s yellow news papers would be proud.
If your spare satellite program is being ran in such an utterly inefficient and wasteful way, there is some real sense to shutting the program down. Especially with alternates coming on-line within a few years.
For more information from Ray Spencer....
"But as NASA’s leader of the U.S. Science Team on one of the best satellite instruments developed for monitoring sea ice, I can tell you we will not lose our ability to monitor sea ice.
Admittedly, the premature failure of the Defense Department’s DMSP F17 and F19 satellites has definitely reduced the number of times a day we can measure the polar regions."
http://www.drroyspencer.com/20...
This is why so many people don't take global warming seriously. Because its proponents resort to cheap tricks like deliberately choosing a word whose common definition makes the situation sound more dire than what actually happened ("destroy - put an end to the existence of (something) by damaging or attacking it."), when they mean one of its lesser-used definitions.
If you practice deceptions and exaggerations like this too often, eventually people stop believing you even when the emergency is real. And that's exactly what's happened with global warming.
Says they dismantled it, not destroyed it. When I think destroy I think explosives or baseball bats or some other violent end. Not somebody taking something apart.
To me, dismantle is the same as to destroy in this case because both actions cause the satellite to be in the same state -- unusable -- regardless how it becomes the state. If they have the satellite been dismantled, it meant that most if not all parts are now gone. Nobody would keep all parts after dismantled it a year ago. Thus, it is similar to the word destroy because you can't assemble or rebuild again within a normal time frame when all parts have already been ordered and/or delivered.
Need fuel to stay in place satellites do. When get too low they do, moved to the graveyard orbit they are.
FTFY
In the US, government employees — specifically legislators — take money and favors from the oil companies in order to slant fuel production, transport, use and pollution remediation strongly towards them in every way they possibly can.
So yes, it is the government that has been (and continues to go on) driving it here in the USA.
Those days are slowly drawing to a close, though. It's long past time for it to happen. Burning oil is a filthy habit.
The only remaining partially jumped hurdle is clean energy storage.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.