A mystery that is giving the United Kingdom government quite a few headaches as it deals with a more unique than rare case: the Skynet 1A satellite launched into orbit in 1969 and operational for a short time before its final breakup, it is not where it should be but has been moved (he doesn’t know by whom) thousands of kilometers from its original orbit.
What was it for?
Before fully understanding the story, we need to take a small step back: this satellite was positioned on the perpendicular of the eastern African coast because it was to be used to transmit communications to the British armed forces. After its brief operation, Skynet 1A would have had to move over the Indian Ocean area because it was sucked in by the Earth’s gravity. The absurd problem is that it is located 36 thousand km above the Americas, practically on the opposite side of where it should be today.
What is a “gravity well”
Experts explain that unused satellites automatically move into what is called a “gravity well” where they find their balance to stay there but in the case of Skynet 1A this did not happen. “Orbital mechanics make it unlikely that the half-ton military spacecraft simply drifted to its current position,” say some experts on the subject BBC. One of the most plausible answers is that someone, around the 1970s, turned on the thrusters to make it head west. It is not known, however, who gave this authority and what the reasons were given that the satellite is unusable because it is completely out of use.
The international connection
Another singular thing is that there is no official document that can testify to this shift which, physics laws in hand, otherwise could never have occurred. According to the reconstructions, it would have been the English and Americans who had the possibility of maneuver but there are no traces of what was reconstructed in any archive. “It’s still relevant because whoever moved Skynet-1A did us few favors“said space consultant Dr. Stuart Eves.
What are the risks
Since it is located in an area not within its competence, Skynet 1A can cause major problems for the traffic of other satellites operating in the Americas with very serious consequences. “It is now in what we call a ‘gravity well’ at 105 degrees west longitude, wandering back and forth like a marble at the bottom of a bowl. And unfortunately this regularly brings it close to other satellite traffic. Since it is dead, there is a risk that it might hit something, and since it is ‘our’ satellite we are still responsible for it“he added.
In recent days the most disparate hypotheses are being formulated about various conspiracies but there is an absolute lack of evidence: what is certain is that the United Kingdom would be forced to pay a very high bill if this satellite collided with others and damaged them. Skynet 1A was produced in the United States by the now defunct aerospace company Philco Ford and launched into space by a US Air Force Delta rocket.
“The first Skynet satellite revolutionized the UK’s telecommunications capability, allowing London to communicate securely with British forces as far away as Singapore. However, from a technological point of view, Skynet 1A was more American than British, as the US both built and launched it“, said Dr. Aaron Bateman explaining the history of the Skynet program now in its fifth generation.
Regardless of how Skynet 1A was moved into its current orbit, it was abandoned to its fate in a very inconvenient area instead of being in a classic “orbital graveyard”: where it currently sits, at 105 degrees west longitude, a satellite active could see a piece of garbage coming within a 50 km radius of its location as many as four times a day.
Since the discovery, Skynet 1A has been constantly monitored by the UK’s National Space Operations Center with timely warnings to all other satellite operators should they have a close encounter with this piece of space junk.