Ending a tense period of waiting and wondering, the U.S. Navy fired a single missile at the non-functioning spy satellite at 10:30 p.m. Eastern time last night and hit the target 130 miles over the Pacific Ocean. The strike was coordinated by Strategic Command in Omaha, Neb., with tracking assists from space command in Colorado Springs and at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
The satellite was targeted to reduce the potential hazard of the human contact with the toxic hydrazine fuel that was on board. The strike occurred as the satellite was still outside the atmosphere in a predictable orbit as it circled the globe every 90 minutes and was traveling at 17,000 miles per hour. The strike will likely add some space debris, but its hoped that roughly half of the debris will slowly descend and burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere.
