- OK, the plan to destroy the failed U.S. spysat continues to develop… this coming Thursday offers the window of opportunity for annihilation, the day after the Atlantis shuttle makes it home. The first missile launch is planned so that, should it fail, a second attempt can then be made by the U.S. Navy. The missile should meet and greet the satellite as it ranges to the 150 mile mark above the Earth’s atmosphere. The missile guidance technology was developed by Lockheed Martin‘s Moorestown facility, where the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System has been developed and manufactured since 1969. You can expect experts from the facility are also aboard the Navy ships in the Pacific Ocean as well as at land stations as they reprogram the Aegis to knock the satellite into kingdom come, with closing velocities estimated to be about 22,000 miles an hour. Let’s not forget how well Aegis has done of late… last November, the defense system detected, ID’d, tracked and simultaneously destroyed two incoming missiles. There was little time for the system to do its work with those two missiles, due to their short range. Aegis integrates guidance, software and radar and the missile itself is manufactured by Raytheon.
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