Satellite turns 50 years old ... in orbit!

News Type: Event — Seeded on Mon Mar 17, 2008 3:37 PM EDT

Article Source: msnbc.com

science, space, nasa, satellites, space-junk, vanguard, u-s-navy, orbital-satellites

A very good article by my friend James Oberg on the 50th anniversary of the launch of the oldest piece of space hardware still in orbit. Your's truly Newsviner is quoted in the piece.

The oldest surviving artificial Earth satellite, Vanguard 1, turned 50 years old on Monday — and continued to turn in its orbit, just as it has done since its launch at the dawn of the Space Age. The craft is in a high orbit that promises to be stable for centuries. Circling there, it has outlived almost all of the human beings who created it.

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8.6

{"commentId":1589081,"authorDomain":"wingod"}

space guy

I was quoted in this article twice. Here is the first one.

Space entrepreneur Dennis Wingo, who has specialized in spaceflight applications of robotics and teleoperations, is the author of "Moonrush: Improving Life on Earth with the Moon's Resources." He told msnbc.com that bringing Vanguard 1 back to Earth could yield at least two important benefits.

"This could be a demonstration of a robust on-orbit servicing capability for industry," he said in an e-mail. Wingo added that studying the recovered Vanguard craft "could give scientists insights not possible otherwise regarding the long-term environmental effects of space and space debris on a spacecraft" orbiting much higher than the international space station and other vehicles accessible to astronauts.

{"commentId":1589081,"threadId":"235949","contentId":"1372562","authorDomain":"wingod"}

3 votes

#1 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 3:41 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589462,"authorDomain":"divbyzero"}

Division by Zero

If anything, we should recover it, study it, and put it in a museum.

{"commentId":1589462,"threadId":"235949","contentId":"1372562","authorDomain":"divbyzero"}

1 vote

#2 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 5:20 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589656,"authorDomain":"sirmonkey"}

sirmonkey

Tracking its orbit helped geophysicists realize that Earth is not round...

Hmm. My public school education fails me 'gain ;)

It would be a nice attraction at the Smithsonian. Is there a replica there already?

Or maybe it could have it's own museum somewhere and fund it's own capture that way. Much like this wonder of invention, which is even older! ;)

{"commentId":1589656,"threadId":"235949","contentId":"1372562","authorDomain":"sirmonkey"}

2 votes

#3 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 6:11 PM EDT

{"commentId":1590045,"authorDomain":"wingod"}

space guy

There is a fully functioning engineering model that I saw several years ago with some of the world's first functioning solar cells.

{"commentId":1590045,"threadId":"235949","contentId":"1372562","authorDomain":"wingod"}

3 votes

#3.1 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 7:59 PM EDT

{"commentId":1593301,"authorDomain":"sirmonkey"}

sirmonkey

They make mention of the instruments falling silent in 64, and of giving a better idea about the earth's precise shape. What were the capabilities of the instruments? What was measured? Was the com link like an old AM radio or was it something pretty advanced for it's day?

{"commentId":1593301,"threadId":"235949","contentId":"1372562","authorDomain":"sirmonkey"}

2 votes

#3.2 - Tue Mar 18, 2008 3:38 PM EDT

{"commentId":1594085,"authorDomain":"wingod"}

space guy

It was probably VHF FM. The instruments were the ones that detected the Van Allen radiation belts and gave a higher resolution view of them than the instruments on the first American satellite, Explorer 1.

The precise shape was detected from measuring changes the the satellite's orbit around the Earth.

{"commentId":1594085,"threadId":"235949","contentId":"1372562","authorDomain":"wingod"}

3 votes

#3.3 - Tue Mar 18, 2008 6:37 PM EDT

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SPACE GUY

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Satellite turns 50 years old ... in orbit!

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