US undergrads crash NASA satellite into Arctic

Re: women at the controls of a space ship.

No cool, man. Even as a joke.

BP would be blamed...

for paying said government to create a _different_ outrage in the Gulf.

And there'd be frontpage pictures of a Greenpeace activist clutching an oily radioactive piece of the satellite to their chest, crying "This poor bird will never fly again!"

You got to be kidding..

.. crash a sat and prove the existence of those "invisible" sub surface oil plumes by igniting them?

Having said that, it maybe could have plugged the hole quicker..

@Tom Welsh

"As a thought experiment, imagine what might be said and done if a foreign nation were to dump one of its old satellites through US airspace into, say, the Gulf of Mexico."

THe US would huff, and it would puff and it would...be completely ineffective at anything. I mean, really, what is the US going to do? Invade your country to steal your Oil? They seem to be remarkably ineffective at that. Lob a missile at you? Because countries that launch satellites don’t have the capability to make the US regret that one right quick.

What’s left? Economic sanctions? What economy? (BTW, those economic sanctions…they worked SO WELL against Cuba. My last vacation there was oh so burdened by the lack of ability to buy…actually, it was bloody awesome.) What /exactly/ is the US going to do to /anyone/ who has the economy or technological capability to launch spacecraft?

If they were REALLY DUMB they might shoot it down. Then they risk turning one dangerous falling object into many. I’m sorry, but if someone deorbited a satellite over US airspace into the ocean the US would be capable of doing exactly sweet **** all about it.

@Alan Firminger

Terrible idea. If a satellite designed to deorbit into the ocean gets hit by debris then you have one (or maybe a smallish number more than one) bits of uncontrollable junk in orbit. If a satellite designed to fragment into bits on contact with atmo gets hit by debris it will SHATTER, and you juve just created the orbital equivalent of a shotgun blast.

From a “how do we dispose of this satellite” standpoint, your idea is brilliant. From a “what happens if the unexpected occurs” standpoint, it’s a hazard.