DARPA's 'Phoenix' Program To Bring Satellites Back From the Dead 88
coondoggie writes "Scientists at DARPA say there are some 1,300 satellites worth over $300B sitting out in Earth's geostationary orbit (GEO) that could be retrofitted or harvested for new communications roles and it designed a program called Phoenix which it says would use a squadron 'satlets' and a larger tender craft to grab out-of-commission satellites and retrofit or retrieve them for parts or reuse." This program incorporates a design challenge aspect, in which various teams compete to design systems to effect the actual capture. From the article: "In the Zero Robotics challenge, three finalist teams emerged from a series of four, one-week qualifying rounds: "y0b0tics!" (Montclair, NJ); "The Catcher in the Skye" (Sparta, NJ); and "Nitro" (Eagleville, PA). Then in June the teams gathered at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to watch via video link as their algorithms were tested on board the ISS, DARPA said. The algorithms were applied across three situations in which the SPHERES satellite simulated an active spacecraft approaching an object tumbling through space. In each scenario, at least one of the teams was able to approach the tumbling target and remain synchronized within the predefined capture region, DARPA said."
Maybe it's just me.... (Score:5, Interesting)
But isn't this technically a form of 'space salvage' or perhaps 'space piracy'? Did they get permission to retrofit these satellites from the owners? What's the 'abandonment period' for spaceborne objects to be considered 'up for grabs'? Assuming they're not already, how long until the military is using this either to capture and repurpose foreign satellites, or perhaps use them as disguised weapons to cause conflict between 3rd party nations?
And that's just what I came up with in the first 15 seconds of reading the summary.
barely relevant comment here (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Maybe it's just me.... (Score:5, Interesting)