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Communications United Kingdom

Somebody Moved UK's Oldest Satellite, No-One Knows Who or Why (bbc.com) 52

The UK's oldest satellite, Skynet-1A, mysteriously shifted from its original orbit above East Africa to a new position over the Americas, likely due to a mid-1970s command whose origins remain unknown. "The question is who that was and with what authority and purpose?" asks the BBC. From the report: "It's still relevant because whoever did move Skynet-1A did us few favours," says space consultant Dr Stuart Eves. "It's now in what we call a 'gravity well' at 105 degrees West longitude, wandering backwards and forwards like a marble at the bottom of a bowl. And unfortunately this brings it close to other satellite traffic on a regular basis. "Because it's dead, the risk is it might bump into something, and because it's 'our' satellite we're still responsible for it," he explains.

Dr Eves has looked through old satellite catalogues, the National Archives and spoken to satellite experts worldwide, but he can find no clues to the end-of-life behaviour of Britain's oldest spacecraft. It might be tempting to reach for a conspiracy theory or two, not least because it's hard to hear the name "Skynet" without thinking of the malevolent, self-aware artificial intelligence (AI) system in The Terminator movie franchise. But there's no connection other than the name and, in any case, real life is always more prosaic.

Somebody Moved UK's Oldest Satellite, No-One Knows Who or Why

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  • It got tired of watching Africa, which is pretty boring. Instead it wanted to look at America where some real shit is about to go down. Its people have handed over control to a cartel of billionaires. Literally placed control of your life into the hands of someone who fired you and thinks you suck if you're not "productive".

    • by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

      It's been like that for like 20 years, my dude.

      • It's been like that for like 20 years, my dude.

        Yes, but we are now moving into the "hold my beer, watch this" phase.

        • by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

          And I'm moving into the phase of my life where I go "Finally something new is about to happen!".

          • And I'm moving into the phase of my life where I go "Finally something new is about to happen!".

            May you live in interesting times may never have been a curse, but interesting is still not necessarily positive. You are a bowl of petunias.

  • ... satellite, Skynet-1A ... Because it's dead ...

    That's exactly what it wants us to think.

    [ Less sinister take: It's just restin' ... :-) ]

  • If the command was issued in the 1970's, why is this only now becoming of interest? There's no mention of the intervening interval. Weird news item.

    • Its more of a fact that its just been noticed and even tho its a defunct satellite, its still the responsibility of the owners - if it hits something else up there because its in the wrong orbit, theres still a liability existing.

      • How is it that it took decades to notice when satellites are tracked and mapped?

        This article must have some critical flaws in reporting. It simply makes no sense. And the 70s were a bit more than 20 years ago, too.

        This was probably a hallucinatory AI written article.

        • How is it that it took decades to notice when satellites are tracked and mapped?

          Tracking says where things are. Particularly for older satellites that were there before they were being tracked, its not necessarily going to know where it is supposed to be.

      • by Hadlock ( 143607 )

        The US tracks every object in space, including debris from crashes between satellites etc. We've been doing this for many decades at this point. It's valuable information you don't want a deorbiting satellite to hit the ISS on the way down, or smash into a spy satellite or the hubble space telescope or whatever. We've known about this probably for 35+ years if not since it went into orbit.

      • by Askmum ( 1038780 )
        If it is defunct but apparently has the ability to move, can't they de-orbit it?
    • This was reported by New Scientist a week or so ago and the perspective I got was that this really a question about properly archiving and curating historical records.

  • So they lost the documentation and presumably all the source code from 50 years ago. Not surprising. I'm guessing most products today doesn't even have such documentation to lose, we find out what a lot of the software does by using it. There are very thin, sometimes invisible lines separating bugs and features.
    • The article itself seems to imply they lost track of the satellite itself in the mid-1970s... and the shift to its current position took place at about that time (the summary is ambiguous, and sort of reads as if the satellite just moved recently as a result of a 50-year-old command).

      • You're right, it's ambiguous. I (possibly mis-)understood it to mean that 50 years ago it had some pre-programmed end-of-life behaviour, which is kicking in now.

  • by flyingfsck ( 986395 ) on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @03:20AM (#64939071)
    On some of these old satellites, the engineering channels still work. People in Brazil use these tricks to communicate for free with friends and family in Portugal for example.
  • Someone in the Pentagon probably moved it for whatever reason.

  • by Znarl ( 23283 ) on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @03:45AM (#64939091) Homepage Journal

    You can so hear the echos of a satellite engineer doing his job for 40 years quietly without supervision. Can see him issuing his command secretly because he knows doing it officially would take too long and result in too many pointless meetings.

    I salute you satellite engineer. Thank you.

  • by gaiageek ( 1070870 ) on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @03:54AM (#64939101)
    From the article, it was US hardware, launched by the US and initially controlled by the US until they gave control to the UK:

    The official, though incomplete, logs of Skynet-1A’s status suggest final commanding was left in the hands of the Americans when Oakhanger lost sight of the satellite in June 1977.

    But however Skynet-1A then got shifted to its present position, it was ultimately allowed to die in an awkward place when really it should have been put in an "orbital graveyard".

    This refers to a region even higher in the sky where old space junk runs zero risk of running into active telecommunications satellites.

    Graveyarding is now standard practice, but back in the 1970s no-one gave much thought to space sustainability.

    • by q_e_t ( 5104099 )
      I hope the UK kept the receipt given it stopped working after 18 months. The 1977 Sales of Goods Act might have just about been in force meaning a potential warranty of 5 years unless a a squaddie popped over to a Radio Shack in Tennessee for it.
    • by q_e_t ( 5104099 )
      Ah, they lost access in 1977. Just a year of warranty then. I'm not sure the concept of extended warranties had been invented in 1975. It's a step beyond the ability to launch satellites or go to the moon.
  • Maybe it's just lonely...

  • Is it really dead if it was capable of responding to such a command? And if it really did them a favour, why didn't they do it themselves?
  • 50 years ago (Score:5, Informative)

    by Dan East ( 318230 ) on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @06:55AM (#64939323) Journal

    Confusing article and even more confusing summary. At first I had the impression that the satellite just moved recently. However the satellite was moved around 50 years ago in the mid 1970s. They just don't know who moved it or why, because the EOL move did not put it in a safer position relative to other orbits.

    Almost certainly, it was commanded to fire its thrusters in the mid-1970s to take it westwards. The question is who that was and with what authority and purpose?

    Both the US and UK had dual control over the satellite, and at times people from the UK would come to the US control center as well, and they think maybe it was moved then. However records are incomplete, which is really the crux of the matter, because there isn't a record saying who moved it or why.

    The official, though incomplete, logs of Skynet-1A’s status suggest final commanding was left in the hands of the Americans when Oakhanger lost sight of the satellite in June 1977.

    My guess is they were just practicing moving things and using it up its remaining fuel in the process, and perhaps hardware testing as well (making sure the thrusters still functioned after so many years in space, etc).

  • I am sure the British government exactly knows who and why. For whatever reasons they rather pretend otherwise.
    • by cstacy ( 534252 )

      I am sure the British government exactly knows who and why. For whatever reasons they rather pretend otherwise.

      Maybe this was the first and last time they did something this dumb without realizing it, and are just embarrassed. So rather than a "We did something dumb once" and a story about everyone's current operations being knowingly dumb (in some way), we get this "Golly! Who knew?" story. Space junk is a major problem. And it's going to be very expensive to clean it up. And an international problem, because moving space junk is risky. And what about moving someone else's junk. Who pays for that? And it would sort

    • by Pimpy ( 143938 )

      Because a conspiracy is a more plausible explanation than lost documentation over the course of 50 years.

  • Sorry about that. I should be more careful next time playing around with my new radios.

  • ... a test of the X-37 satellite capture and release capabilities.

  • Old testament [watch.plex.tv]
    New testament [watch.plex.tv]

  • Why hasn't it been moved into a controlled decaying orbit?
    • by q_e_t ( 5104099 )
      Because it's unresponsive so can't be moved under its own power and moving satellites about otherwise is expensive. About the best you can hope to do cheaply is tempt into another orbit via a trail of custard creams.
  • by quax ( 19371 ) on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @04:19PM (#64940803)

    "in any case, real life is always more prosaic."

    Whoever wrote this must have lived under a rock the last decade or so.

    I envy them.

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