Date: Tue, 6 Oct 92 05:00:08 From: Space Digest maintainer Reply-To: Space-request@isu.isunet.edu Subject: Space Digest V15 #286 To: Space Digest Readers Precedence: bulk Space Digest Tue, 6 Oct 92 Volume 15 : Issue 286 Today's Topics: Alleged Benefits of Military $ Amber (Was: Re: Population) another sad anniversary (2 msgs) Automated mail > file cat & decoding ? Blue Danube Controversy over V-2 anniversary Laser Space Mirror Mars Observer info? Population here and elsewhere? Robert H. Goddard - Born 110 Years Ago Today Space and Presidential Politics (3 msgs) Switching ALSEP back on (was Re: another sad anniversary) Von Braun -- Hero, Villain, or Both? What is this ? (2 msgs) Welcome to the Space Digest!! Please send your messages to "space@isu.isunet.edu", and (un)subscription requests of the form "Subscribe Space " to one of these addresses: listserv@uga (BITNET), rice::boyle (SPAN/NSInet), utadnx::utspan::rice::boyle (THENET), or space-REQUEST@isu.isunet.edu (Internet). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 4 Oct 92 20:53:00 GMT From: Mark Goodman Subject: Alleged Benefits of Military $ Newsgroups: sci.space Reply-To: mwgoodman@igc.org Steinn Sigurdsson writes: >In article <1469100017@igc.apc.org> Mark Goodman writes: > > > > Military and aerospace dollars have a particularly > >high multiplier, 7x, because the jobs pay well and allow the workers > > > I wonder where these numbers come from. They seem implausible > to me, and would in any case be very hard to measure. Everything > I have read suggests precisely the opposite, that money spent on > the military and other unproductive high-technology efforts (read > NASA) is particularly unbeneficial to the economy. > >Try Nature _355_ 107, 1992. > >So what are your sources? I will try to find the article you mention. But let me explain why I think the numbers are implausible. Military spending goes primarily to high income people in capital intensive industries. It is known to produce far fewer jobs (about a factor of 3, if I recall) than the same amount of money spend on public works or education. I haven't looked at this in a while, so I don't have references, but the Council on Economic Priorities will. I believe it is also true that higher income people spend less of their money than low income people, so their money is likely to go into the economy fewer times. I have heard this as an explanation for the fact that the increase in income during the Reagan years did not produce sustained increases in consumer demand; the increases went to people who spend less of their money. Not being an economist, I cannot vouch for the validity of this argument, but it tends to contradict what Gary said. It is important to note that military spending is essentially wasteful in the narrow sense that it produces no product or public resource with economic value. Building a highway contributes to the economy by facilitating transportation. Building a fighter aircraft does not. Technological spinoffs have become increasingly rare as military technology has become increasingly specialized and isolated from civilian technologies. In the broader sense, of course, military spending can be extremely valuable if it contributes to national security. I think the debate over military spending should rest on our security needs, not on disputed economic claims. Brad Wallet writes (in response to my skepticism): >You may dispute [Gary's] numbers, but at least he offered some data. To >simple say "I have read" simply will not do. Offer either data or >logical reasoning. See the above. I would hardly call Gary's numbers "data," however. >In an earlier posting, you said you worked in Congress. No doubt you >are pushing sometime of political agenda. I respect that you admit >that you are going to be biased. Undoubtable, some will accuse me of >being biased because I work for the military. I just want to state >that I work for the military because I believe what it does is necessary. >Not vice versa. Let me explain my position. I am a Congressional Science Fellow, paid by but not representing the American Institute of Physics to work for Congress for one year. I have just started, and am now interviewing to see who might want me. (As an aside, AIP opposes the Space Station because it's not good -- or cost-effective -- science. I think that's correct, but misses the point. The space station isn't about science; it's about human spaceflight. I just don't think human spaceflight is that important.) I don't understand why you think having a connection with Congress should associate me with any particular political agenda. Congressional staff members are not expected to pursue their own agendas, but those of their bosses. Members of Congress have almost as wide a variety of agendas as those expressed on the internet. In any case, their agendas are a reflection of their constituents and (unfortunately) their campaign contributors and lobbyists, among whom military contractors are an especially influential group. I hope to help Congress develop better public policies by providing sound technical guidance where I can. I may offer nontechnical judgments as well, but I will do my best to distinguish clearly between technical analysis and personal opinion. Mark W. Goodman ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 22:48:37 GMT From: Ron Baalke Subject: Amber (Was: Re: Population) Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.geo.geology In article <1992Oct5.055751.19337@news.Hawaii.Edu>, joe@montebello.soest.hawaii.edu (Joe Dellinger) writes... >In article <9210010007.AA08683@cmr.ncsl.nist.gov>, roberts@CMR.NCSL.NIST.GOV (John Roberts) writes... >> I believe the current (and recent) record for DNA extraction is ~25 million >> years, for a termite trapped in amber. Reconstructing the entire genetic >> code from DNA fragments and using that code to produce a living organism >> are additional challenges. > > In the Sept 1992 "Natural History" magazine, Stephen J. Gould >writes that the "current" record is for chloroplast DNA from preserved tree >leaves in the Clarkia lake beds, 17-22 Million years old. The Clarkia >preservation is extremely unusual: leaves falling right into an anoxic lake >bottom, rapid burial, and an anoxic environment continuously maintained until >present. Even so they still haven't managed to get nuclear DNA.... yet. I've heard that Dr. Poiner from UC Berkeley cloned some blood cells from a stingless bee from amber recently. I've heard this from word of mouth, so I'm trying to find out the details. Dr. Poiner, by the way, was the first to extract DNA from amber in 1982. ___ _____ ___ /_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov | | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab | ___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Einstein's brain is stored /___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | in a mason jar in a lab |_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | in Wichita, Kansas. ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 13:00:36 GMT From: Gary Coffman Subject: another sad anniversary Newsgroups: sci.space In article henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes: > >The Apollo lunar instruments might have been an exception. They weren't >complex, they were mostly just sitting there sending data, and they were >close enough that a *really good* amateur setup might have been able to >receive from them. Continued operation just might have been within reach >of amateur efforts, barely. It would have been pushing the amateur state of the art at the time. Perhaps a dozen stations were capable of receiving the signals then. Today there are thousands that could do the job. Such is progress. Gary KE4ZV ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 13:31:15 GMT From: Gary Coffman Subject: another sad anniversary Newsgroups: sci.space In article <1OCT199219492037@judy.uh.edu> wingo%cspara.decnet@Fedex.Msfc.Nasa.Gov writes: > >The dowlink path loss is -278 db from the moon. This is incorrect. That figure is the round trip loss at 2.3 GHz for a signal beamed from Earth, passively reflected from the Moon, and received again on Earth. The free space path loss from an active transmitter on the Moon to an earthbound receiver is less, about 196 db. This figure is frequency dependent with lower frequencies having less path loss and higher frequencies having more. The figure is for isotropic antennas. Antenna gain scales up with increasing frequency for the same physical size antenna, balancing out increased path loss. MDS on amateur receivers in the 1970s was around -136 dbm. It's about 10 db better today with a typical multimode getting down to -146 dbm. Specialized GasFet preamps can improve that by another 20 db today for under $100, though not in the 1970s. So about 20 db of antenna gain would bring a 1 watt signal on the Moon into detectability on modern amateur equipment. That's the kind of setup that is typical of users of the amateur satellites. With a 12 foot dish, 30 db of antenna gain is available giving you a 10 db C/N ratio. That's within reach of home satellite systems. Anyone willing to spend a couple of thousand dollars could receive a 1 watt signal from the Moon with sufficient margin to decode digital data, or copy analog voice. An EME grade station is probably still required to pick up video, or high bandwidth data. Gary KE4ZV ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 09:56:21 GMT From: Borre Ludvigsen Subject: Automated mail > file cat & decoding ? Newsgroups: sci.space Automated mail > file cat & decoding ? We need a shell script, program, gizmo that reads a mail spool file, recognizes a series of uuencoded images (which are not necessarily in the right order), extracts them, cats them in the right order, strips headers and decodes. Tall order? We're running the Internet anonymous ftp site for the NOA/NESDIS wxsat waffle server being run by the System Support Group. Images are fed over as mail. They're not always in the right order and other type of mail will be interspersed. It would of course, also be useful to have other, plain mail automatically saved too. Ideally, we're looking for a mail reading agent with an IQ high enough to see the difference between text and uuencoded binary and to know what to do with it. Ie. read, sort, convert and sluice it to the right directory of anonymous ftp account. If anyone has any tips, scripts or code that they think might help, we'd be etarnally grateful. Kjell Are Refsvik & Barre Ludvigsen ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 14:19:34 GMT From: "Harold H. Ipolyi 713-486-6444" Subject: Blue Danube Newsgroups: sci.space In article , jay@deepthot.cary.nc.us (Jay Denebeim) writes: |> If its 100 years, its forever. We'll run out of enough energy to put the |> first SPS up if we don't start much sooner than that. No problem. Our one remaining land-fill will be tall enough so we can just winch it up :) Of course if you mean oil by "energy", then remember that other Nations are not as finicky about nuclear power as we are, so in 100 years we'll still be buying foreign energy, only a different kind :( ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 13:45:46 GMT From: Jonathan McDowell Subject: Controversy over V-2 anniversary Newsgroups: sci.space From article , by shafer@rigel.dfrf.nasa.gov (Mary Shafer): [About "our Germans":] > > That still doesn't make it right. Not persecuting people for crimes > against humanity because they may be useful to you is wrong. Period. > Mary I agree with you about that, Mary; and certainly there were members of the Peenemunde team who had a prima facie case to answer on war crimes. But it's the usual question: how much did you know and when did you know it? There is a large body of anecdotal evidence, some of it possibly even accurate, that von Braun himself was only interested in building missiles as a route to building space rockets, and a lot of people have defended him on those grounds - he wasn't really happy about bombing London. Personally I think that's irrelevant, participating in the war effort was one thing but being complicit in the mass murder in the labor camps used to build the weapons is quite another. It seems to me quite possible that during development and early testing of the V-2 there wasn't much involvment of the labor camps, and it was only when they went into production that slave labour was used. At what point did von Braun know about this? My guess is quite early on and that he didn't care a bean, but I'm think the question is a valid one historically. At what point are you criminally complicit in a crime against humanity? (For instance, are those Americans who voted for governments which gave support to the genocidal regime in Indonesia in the '60s complicit in that crime?) My personal opinion is that the hagiography of von Braun and his colleagues prevalent in a certain city in Alabama is inappropriate, that they were likely guilty of war crimes in some degree, but that they were not responsible to anything like the same degree that those that ran the camps and oversaw the camp system, many of whom (like Krupp) spent a few brief years in jail and emerged to become rich, respected and powerful. I also feel that the first A-4 flight (it wasn't called the V-2 yet) was not a product of the Nazi camp system but more directly of the Peenemunde military R&D team; so while I don't think it good to celebrate the anniversary of the V-2 weapon system, I feel fine about celebrating the Oct 1942 flight from Test Stand VII as the first rocket flight into space. .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS4 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : mcdowell@urania.harvard.edu | | USA | inter : mcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | '-----------------------------------------------------------------------------' ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 13:16:38 GMT From: Ian Taylor Subject: Laser Space Mirror Newsgroups: sci.space In article ralph.buttigieg@f635.n713.z3.fido.zeta.org.au (Ralph Buttigieg) writes: >Perhaps in the short term building a Space electricity transmitter would be >better than a SPS. > >Put a flat optical mirror in Clarke orbit. Build a laser transmitters near a >ground based power station. New Scientist this week (No 1841, 3 October 1992) reports that next month a crewless Progress spacecraft will open a space mirror after resupplying Mir at an altitude of 350 km. The solar reflector is 20 metres across and will be unfurled by centrifugal force. The mirror weighs 4 kg and is made from aluminium coated plastic film 5 micrometres thick, it is attached to a 36 Kg frame and costs $60,000. The plan is to test the effectiveness of using space based mirrors to provide illumination for ground based artic locations! +---I----- fax +43 1 391452 ------------------------- voice +43 1 391621 169 --+ | T a y l o r Alcatel-ELIN Research, 1-7 Ruthnergasse, Vienna A-1210 Austria | +-- n ---- ian@rcvie.co.at --- PSI%023226191002::SE_TAYLOR --- 20731::ian -----+ better, smaller, faster, cheaper, smarter, brighter ... never? ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 07:09:58 EDT From: Chris Jones Subject: Mars Observer info? Newsgroups: sci.space In article , niininen@messi (Kristian Niininen) writes: >How big is the Mars Observer? (weight, length etc.) >What kinds of instruments it has? Payload Weight 156 kg (343 lb) Total Weight 2573 kg (5672 lb) Size (launch configuration): Length 1.6 m (5.0 ft) Width 2.2 m (7.0 ft) Height 1.1 m (3.25 ft) Solar array six 183 x 219 x 9.1-centimeter (6 x 7.2 x 0.3-foot) (arranged in a 3 x 2 rectangle, the middle 2 panels are left folded during the cruise to Mars) There are seven science instruments: Gamma Ray Spectrometer (GRS) Mars Observer Camera (MOC) Thermal Emission Spectrometer (TES) Pressure Modulator Infrared Radiometer (PMIRR) Mars Observer Laser Altimeter (MOLA) Magnetometer and Electron Reflectometer (MAG/ER) Mars Balloon Relay (MBR) (This last instrument is provided by the French, and is designed to act as a backup relay antenna for the Russian Mars 94 and 96 missions.) There are three 6 meter booms extending from the spacecraft. One holds the high gain antenna, and the other two have scientific instruments (the GRS on one and the MAG and ER on the other). This information is from the Mars Observer Press Kit, posted to sci.space.news a month ago, and from the 17 August 1992 issue of Aviation Week. -- Chris Jones clj@ksr.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 14:37:39 GMT From: Gary Davis Subject: Population here and elsewhere? Newsgroups: sci.space With the relatively low priority and lack of basic understanding of our environment shown by most on this board;it is indeed merciful that none are actively in this area. What does bringing back dinosaurs have to do with such a critical human dilemma as uncontrolled population growth. Persons who ecourage such must either be quite ignorant of the future consequences or so insensitive to the situation that reason eludes them. Rush Limbaugh was quoted recently as stating that population growth was a "phoney" issue since if we move the entire world pouplation as it exists presently, to the state of Texas the human density would equal that of New York City. Pooh.. Pooh.. population growth and the environment are a ploy of the liberals! Aside from the fact that Limbaugh is a pompus donkey;the truly frightening part is he has so many mindless idolators in his ranks. Yes, if he had his way I'm sure Earth would become the planet Gideon. -- Gary E. Davis WQ1F (On AO13) University of Vermont Land Liner's dial 802-656-1916 References " The Joys of Rumination Without The Cud", Elsie circa 1965 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 16:40:07 GMT From: Larry Klaes Subject: Robert H. Goddard - Born 110 Years Ago Today Newsgroups: sci.astro,sci.space,sci.misc,alt.sci.planetary On this date (October 5) in 1882, Robert Hutchings Goddard was born in Worcester, Massachusetts (about eighty kilometers west of Boston). Goddard launched the world's first liquid-fueled rocket in March of 1926 in Auburn, MA, along with many other contributions to the development of modern rocketry. Goddard died in August of 1945. Larry Klaes klaes@verga.enet.dec.com or - ...!decwrl!verga.enet.dec.com!klaes or - klaes%verga.dec@decwrl.enet.dec.com or - klaes%verga.enet.dec.com@uunet.uu.net "All the Universe, or nothing!" - H. G. Wells EJASA Editor, Astronomical Society of the Atlantic ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 5 Oct 92 11:19:08 BST From: amon@elegabalus.cs.qub.ac.uk Subject: Space and Presidential Politics > Yes, I can. It doesn't simply come down to "everyone has > their own values, and everyone's are as good everyone else's." > Nor does it simply come down to the public interest being that > of the private intrests of the majority. Taken to extremes, your > statement becomes "we can't tell the Nazis they are wrong. If the > majority of the people support them, what they are doing must > be in the public interest." > Why then democracy, if not to settle differences between different views and special interests? > Besides, in a sense, isn't the above statement hypocritical. Many > people in America don't think space is all that important. > Space enthusiast have always felt that it was OK to tell them > that they're priorities were wrong and that they should think > more about the future. > Hardly. If the majority don't want the government to do anything in space, the government will do nothing in space. Which is fine with me anyway because I'd rather it be done privately. Some people think space is important. Many more people hug trees. Even more people cut them down. Each is an interest, and although balanced somewhat by other "ideals" in the case of most people, the ultimate vote is always with the wallet, ie the local personal issue has more to do with the typical vote than "issues" and "causes". "In a democracy people get exactly the government they deserve" - Probably H.L. Mencken ------------------------------ Date: 4 Oct 92 20:49:00 GMT From: Mark Goodman Subject: Space and Presidential Politics Newsgroups: sci.space Reply-To: mwgoodman@igc.org Steinn Sigurdsson writes: >In article <1469100018@igc.apc.org> Mark Goodman writes: > > important issue than the space program. I continue to believe that. > I find the pipedreams that human space exploration offers an economic > bonanza incredible, at least for the foreseeable future. I don't think > >So, obvious question, how long is "foreseeable"? >As you are working "in" [sic] Congress can we >assume that it is order two years? By the foreseeable future I mean my lifetime, and probably my children's lifetime. I am 32, and my son is 4. I like to compare it with the prospects for fusion reactors. For the last 40 years, we have been told that commercial fusion power is 40 years away. I take that to mean that we have no idea how long it might take, and that it may never happen. I take a slightly less skeptical attitude toward human space exploration. Although the capital costs of any large-scale continuing human presence in space seem prohibitive, I admit that there could be economically viable activities to overcome this barrier. We just don't know what they might be yet. By the way, I think there are great economic benefits from other space endeavors, notably communications and remote sensing. It's just that these don't require people. Mark W. Goodman ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 14:15:31 GMT From: Herman Rubin Subject: Space and Presidential Politics Newsgroups: sci.space In article amon@elegabalus.cs.qub.ac.uk writes: >> Yes, I can. It doesn't simply come down to "everyone has >> their own values, and everyone's are as good everyone else's." >> Nor does it simply come down to the public interest being that >> of the private intrests of the majority. Taken to extremes, your >> statement becomes "we can't tell the Nazis they are wrong. If the >> majority of the people support them, what they are doing must >> be in the public interest." >Why then democracy, if not to settle differences between different >views and special interests? Is democracy that great in a situation like this? Do we progress by only doing what the majority wants? Even the British socialist George Bernard Shaw did not think so. Quoting from memory, The reasonable man adapts himself to his environment. The unreasonable man attempts to adapt the environment to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man. One cannot expect the mass of the public to attempt to soar with the eagles, or to even realize the joy of striving. At most one can hope for grudging support, and non-interference. >> Besides, in a sense, isn't the above statement hypocritical. Many >> people in America don't think space is all that important. >> Space enthusiast have always felt that it was OK to tell them >> that they're priorities were wrong and that they should think >> more about the future. >Hardly. If the majority don't want the government to do anything in >space, the government will do nothing in space. Which is fine with me >anyway because I'd rather it be done privately. But there is a rub. The present legal and political situation restricts what can be done privately. I too advocate doing it privately, and this means that the governments have the obligation to get out of the way. >Some people think space is important. Many more people hug trees. >Even more people cut them down. Each is an interest, and although >balanced somewhat by other "ideals" in the case of most people, the >ultimate vote is always with the wallet, ie the local personal issue >has more to do with the typical vote than "issues" and "causes". >"In a democracy people get exactly the government they deserve" > - Probably H.L. Mencken And too many believe that the government can solve all problems. -- Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399 Phone: (317)494-6054 hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Internet, bitnet) {purdue,pur-ee}!pop.stat!hrubin(UUCP) ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 16:12:08 GMT From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey Subject: Switching ALSEP back on (was Re: another sad anniversary) Newsgroups: sci.space In article , henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes: > In article <1689@tnc.UUCP> m0102@tnc.UUCP (FRANK NEY) writes: >>Is there any way to turn ALSEP back on once we get the ground station >>set up properly? Or was it a no-return type of prodedure? > > Such turnoff procedures are usually irreversible, I believe, to minimize > the chances of dying hardware later reversing them on its own. I'm not > sure about ALSEP in particular. Oh, I don't know. Armed with a soldering iron, a wiring diagram, and a space suit, I imagine you'd find it pretty easy. > In any event, I suspect that the ALSEP RTGs have long since passed the > point where they no longer supply enough power to keep things running. > Limits were being felt there at the time of turnoff. Was it a plutonium-238 RTG? 238Pu has a half-life of 86 years, but available power from RTGs seems to drop off at a faster rate than that, for reasons that aren't clear to me. O~~* /_) ' / / /_/ ' , , ' ,_ _ \|/ - ~ -~~~~~~~~~~~/_) / / / / / / (_) (_) / / / _\~~~~~~~~~~~zap! / \ (_) (_) / | \ | | Bill Higgins Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory \ / Bitnet: HIGGINS@FNAL.BITNET - - Internet: HIGGINS@FNAL.FNAL.GOV ~ SPAN/Hepnet: 43011::HIGGINS ------------------------------ Date: 5 Oct 92 12:29:05 GMT From: Thomas Clarke Subject: Von Braun -- Hero, Villain, or Both? Newsgroups: sci.space I recall reading that there was a plot to spirit von Braun out of Germany into England. The plot was busted and von Braun was set for execution when someone whispered in the fuhrer's ear that if he wanted his Vengance-2 weapon, he had better commute the sentence of Herr von Braun. Somewhat less reverently, I also recall the words to Tom Lehrer's 60's ditty: "'The rockets go up. I don't know where they come down. That's not my department,' says Werner von Braun." -- Thomas Clarke Institute for Simulation and Training, University of Central FL 12424 Research Parkway, Suite 300, Orlando, FL 32826 (407)658-5030, FAX: (407)658-5059, clarke@acme.ucf.edu ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 05 Oct 92 14:45:43 MET From: PHARABOD@FRCPN11.IN2P3.FR Subject: What is this ? Phil G. Fraering changes my title "What is this ?" into "Mystery Alien Object Invading European Airspace..." (I must say I disagree with this new title) and writes (Fri, 2 Oct 92 12:24:33 -0500): \Could not be an air to ground missile since nothing fell to the ground. /Since the altitude displayed on the F-16's Westinghouse APG-66 radar \display screen (upper right hand corner) has only two digits, 00 on /this screen, and 0000 in the quoted report, means anything between \0 and 500 feet (I think 0 = ground level, not sea level). The speed is /the absolute value of the real 3-D vector speed (air speed ?), not the \absolute value of its 2-D vector projection on the ground. (J. Pharabod) (There is something wrong in what I wrote above: 0 was not ground level, but sea level. Altitude of the ground is around 200 feet in this area of Belgium - J. Pharabod) >Don't be so sure. Have you heard of penetrators? It might have hit the >ground and buried itself and gone unnoticed. (P. Fraering) Interesting. Yes, I heard of those. Who could drop penetrators in a highly populated area of Western Europe ? \Nobody knows what it was (I mean, those who know keep silent...). In /its SUMMARY REPORT ON OBSERVATIONS 30-31 MARCH 1990, Colonel (now \General) De Brouwer, of the Belgian Air Force, writes: /"............... \ A total of 9 interception attempts have been made. / At 6 occasions the pilots could establish a lock-on with their air \ interception radar. Lock-on distances varied between 5 and 8 NM. On / all occasions targets varied speed and altitude very quickly and \ break-locks occurred after 10 to 60 seconds. Speeds varied between / 150 and 1010 knots. At 3 occasions both F-16 registered simultaneous \ lock-ons with the same parameters. The 2 F-16 were flying +- 2 NM / apart. ............." (J. Pharabod) >Just wondering, but I recall a while back that some Viggens on >excercises in the Baltic once tried a lock-on to an SR-71, just to >prove that they could catch it if they wanted to. This was "way >back when." >Target lock lasted all of three seconds before being overwhelmed >by ECM. (P. Fraering) Very interesting. > The "black" projects the US has been building all have >heavy emphasis on stealth characteristics (passive ECM, as it were) >and more active forms of ECM. >I have heard speculation that the Belgian UFO's were American spook >vehicles that were not capable of that sort of acceleration, but >of making an F-16's radar _think_ it had seen something that could >do that. (P. Fraering) Yes. This, for instance, had been advanced by the French monthly "Science et Vie", mainly in the article "C'est vrai: je l'ai vu" by Dominique Caudron, October 1990. I heard that the Belgian military, after a lengthy study of the video record of the radar display screen, don't think it was ECM (at least, that they are pretty sure it was not any kind of ECM known to them). But I am waiting for confirmation. The problem with this kind of inquiry is that you have: 1) only a part of official reports, since much is classified (as far as I know, not "top secret", but only "confidential") 2) more or less direct information about the classified part (private discussions, letters or phone calls). Therefore I am still not convinced that it was not ECM. J. Pharabod ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 05 Oct 92 15:36:58 MET From: PHARABOD@FRCPN11.IN2P3.FR Subject: What is this ? Topcoat writes (3 Oct 92 19:49:15 GMT): >>Not necessarily, since the altitude displayed on the F-16's Westinghouse >>APG-66 radar display screen (upper right hand corner) has only two >>digits. 07 means 7000 + or - 500, 12 means 12000 + or - 500, etc... >>So in this report, 7000 could be 6501, and 6000 could be 6499. >> >>J. Pharabod >Looks like bad data, was the source a pulse doppler radar or pulse? What do you mean by "source" ? If it is the radar which registered the echoes, it was a Westinghouse APG-66 (a fairly common model for F-16), in air-to-air mode, with radar range selected 10. If you mean the target, that is the question. > If >this was FAA "primary" data I'd call it jitter and disregard The Belgian military did not call it jitter, and did not disregard. There are several other records (there were several lock-ons that night). J. Pharabod ------------------------------ End of Space Digest Volume 15 : Issue 286 ------------------------------