Scrutable

An interesting article in The Atlantic about how some wide field Astronomical Survey Facilities have to work within constraints set by the US Security Services so as to keep the locations of spy satellites out of the public domain.
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/arc ... te/680814/?

The article is prompted by the imminent opening of the Vera C Rubin Observatory - which will have the capability of surveying almost the entire night sky every 3 days, One of its objectives is to identify anything that changes over that period - whether the movement of an asteroid, a star going Supernova or whatever.
In doing this it will inevitably end up with the images of multiple US spy satellites operated by the NRO . An existing procedure is in place for Pan-STARRS operation on Hawaii. Part of the value of the facility is the opportunity it gives to provide alerts to astronomers of any changes that have been detected so that other telescopes can be brought into operation.
With Pan-STARRS, each 30s image is encrypted, sight unseen, and sent to a secure facility where it is compared with a previous image. Any difference means that region of the image is cut out, and is then assessed whether 'the difference' might be an US Spy Satellite.

If clear, the region of the image, plus its coordinates are sent within minutes to places like the Astronomer's Telegram service to be notified to the astronomical community.
The full, unredacted image is released to astronomers after 3 days - by which time it is expected that there will be little value to anyone seeing a track that might be an NRO Satellite.

Presumably the serious state enemies of the US have their own telescopes, from which they obtain this information anyway?

nekomatic wrote: Tue Dec 03, 2024 6:07 pm Presumably the serious state enemies of the US have their own telescopes, from which they obtain this information anyway?

Not necessarily - having an all-sky capability doesn't come cheap.

The second episode of the very excellent 16 Sunsets Podcast* (about the history of the Space Shuttle) covers how the US Air Force made demands that pretty much determined the shape, size and capability of the Shuttle.
For example, for purely scientific purposes it wouldn't have needed such large wings, but the Air Force required it to be able to be launched from Vandenberg AFB into a Polar orbit, so that it could get over anywhere in the world within 90 minutes and either make observations, or deploy or recover a spy satellite and return to KSC or Edwards AFB within another 90 minutes. The strategic advantage was that it would be almost undetectable at the time from the ground.

However, to be able to return after just one or two orbits meant that it needed to be able to glide for a several thousand miles - which results in the wings being the size they are.

* https://sixteensunsets.com/
It's made by much of the same team that produced the 13 Minutes to the Moon series for the BBC World Service, and is narrated by Kevin Fong. Highly Recommended (as is the original series)

As an aside - for a highly secretive organisation - the NRO issues some entertaining patches to commemorate each launch of a satellite...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NRO_launches

bob sterman wrote: Tue Dec 03, 2024 6:49 pm As an aside - for a highly secretive organisation - the NRO issues some entertaining patches to commemorate each launch of a satellite...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NRO_launches

They tell us the things they can't easily hide

"Things they can't easily hide" includes pretty much any satellite.

It's really not hard to build small systems with all-sky capability and sufficient resolution to detect satellites. Imaging the satellites is harder, but well within the capabilities of national observatories in any nation with a moderate industrial base.

There are several European, Japanese and Chinese projects with the capability to spot and image US satellites.