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LOS ANGELES - It sounds like the plot of a bad Hollywood movie. A dying US spy satellite is hurtling towards Earth. Military specialists worry that its toxic fuel load could contaminate a populated area. A resolute President gives the order to shoot the satellite down ...
The US military will indeed try to shoot down a rogue satellite this week but almost nobody believes the public health rationale offered for the missile strike, seeing it instead as an attempt by the US to test out space weaponry.
The satellite does contain about 450kg of a toxic fuel called hydrazine, but the risk, even if the fuel did spill out, is so minimal as to be laughable, according to experts.
"There has not been a single human being who has been harmed by man-made objects falling from space," Michael Krepon of the Henry L Stimson Centre, a military think-tank, told the Washington Post.
Other researchers point out that 42 objects fell to Earth last year, including one with a form of hydrazine on board and a dozen others containing hydrazine residue.
- INDEPENDENT
