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A classified satellite launched by SpaceX on Sunday may be experiencing a classified failure:
Later on Monday afternoon another space reporter, Peter B. de Selding, reported on Twitter that he too had been hearing about problems with the satellite. "Zuma satellite from @northropgrumman may be dead in orbit after separation from @SpaceX Falcon 9, sources say," de Selding tweeted. "Info blackout renders any conclusion - launcher issue? Satellite-only issue? — impossible to draw."
Update: SpaceX said the Falcon 9 rocket performed nominally, but unnamed sources reportedly told the Wall Street Journal that the payload did not separate from the Falcon 9 second stage and that both fell into the ocean:
An expensive, highly classified U.S. spy satellite is presumed to be a total loss after it failed to reach orbit atop a Space Exploration Technologies Corp. rocket on Sunday, according to industry and government officials. Lawmakers and congressional staffers from the Senate and the House have been briefed about the botched mission, some of the officials said. The secret payload—code-named Zuma and launched from Florida on board a Falcon 9 rocket—is believed to have plummeted back into the atmosphere, they said, because it didn't separate as planned from the upper part of the rocket.
The WSJ report has been disputed. Space-Track has catalogued the Zuma payload as USA 280, international designation 2018-001A, catalog number 43098, but that doesn't necessarily mean Zuma survived. CelesTrak lists the status as operational (search 43098 in NORAD Catalog Number field).
If the mission did fail, SpaceX could also blame Northrup Grumman for using their own payload adapter.
Also at CBS News, SpaceFlight Insider, Bloomberg, Popular Mechanics, CNBC, and USA Today.
(Score: 2) by Snow on Tuesday January 09 2018, @04:04PM (8 children)
Satellites are really easy to track by amateurs. It's a reasonable assumption that if it was actually still in orbit, someone would call them out.
(Score: 2) by KilroySmith on Tuesday January 09 2018, @04:27PM
Agreed - to my layman's understanding, there really isn't much of a reason to try to hide a satellite. Russia, China, the EU ground based radar can track anything larger than a baseball, and amateur satellites can track basketball sized items, so unless this billion-dollar satellite was composed of hundreds of baseball-sized mini-sats it'll be known whether it is in orbit or not.
Unless, of course, the only people meant to be fooled by this cover story are Americans. Perhaps this satellite is just another step in establishing the Trumpocracy!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Gaaark on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:14PM (6 children)
Can you hide a satellite? Stealth equipped?
I dunno... serious question. Is it possible? Can you hide it this way and keep it dormant so it can't be tracked by emissions and then activated when needed?
Seriously. Possible?
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Interesting) by mhajicek on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:51PM
I should think so. If you can stealth an airplane a satellite should be easy.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @07:57PM
A reasonable assumption is that most stealth satellites share launches with decoys. The decoys could be useful themselves.
Stealth satellites have been seen due to operational mistakes. For example, a satellite can be stealth when seen from one direction but not from another. Canadian amateurs spotted one that wasn't visible while passing over Russia. There was a "failed" launch with a debris cloud... and then a chunk of the debris was spotted moving in an obviously controlled manner.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Tuesday January 09 2018, @08:01PM (2 children)
So-called "stealth" technologies in current use provide camouflage from radar.
Could you add that to a satellite? Sure, but it'll mean leaving something else off to make weight.
And it won't keep amateurs with telescopes from tracking it. Visible light. So it wouldn't matter in this context. It might help if someone tried to shoot it down with a radar guided missile though.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @08:15PM (1 child)
My first thought was black paint. But then, the moon is quite black, and yet still very clearly visible …
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Tuesday January 09 2018, @08:44PM
What they detect visually is when the satellite moves between the observer and a star.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 10 2018, @10:17AM
According to TFA they are hiding it in the ocean.