3 ms·
> Given the current situation, USA/SpaceX is in a far better position to quickly repopulate LEO with satellites when the debris has fallen down It's far cheape
by sangnoir 4y ago
> Given the current situation, USA/SpaceX is in a far better position to quickly repopulate LEO with satellites when the debris has fallen down
It's far cheaper to heft tens of thousands of ball bearings into orbit vs a single satellite. You can give them a nice spread so you have a space shotgun that ruin an orbit for years at a time. The decay is a bonus to the attacker[1] because they can a go all out during wartime, without impacting their long-term space-faring program.
1. The decay also allows the same armaments to cover a larger vertical slice of the orbit.
- basementcat 4y agoYou mean like Project West Ford? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_West_Ford https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_West_Ford
- sangnoir 4y agoI was thinking having the projectiles being aerodynamic may increase decay time, then realized you can have the launch vehicle use solar power to fire the metal spheres using a railgun mechanism. This way, you can get vastly larger areas of denial by firing at an angle perpendicular to that of travel. You can have an every-shifting debris field if you fire 2 ball-bearings (port and starboard) every 10-50 meters to make that entire altitude unusable[1] - not just a specific orbit. Edit: 1. The perigee and apogee will differ for projectiles fired from port or starboard based on launch vehicle inclination and the resulting relative speeds to earth. It would be a nightmare to track and avoid the resulting mess.