Welcome to the 21st century and 3rd millenium. Oh, I know that many readers thought they were already in those eras for the last year because of erroneous proclamations by the news media last January. Time Magazine and Newsweek had covers announcing the arrival of the 21st Century on January 1, 2000. But like the announcements on November 3 by the press, first that Gore had won Florida before the polls had even closed, and then that Bush had won the Presidency, they were simply errors in a headlong rush to be the first the press sometimes makes. One such major error of this sort was made in 1983, and very few in the public ever realized it.
A major error by the press in 1983? That was the year the press suddenly focused on Pioneer 10 proclaiming it to be the 1st spacecraft to leave the solar system. Pioneer 10 was at the time about to cross the orbit of the outer planet, and we suddenly had a news media event with many reporting on the auspicious occasion the the 1st spacecraft to leave the solar system. However, I have possibly shocking news to many people both who reported on that event years ago and who listened or read those news stories: No spacecraft has yet left the solar system! We have 3 spacecraft out at the very edge of the solar system (~20 billion miles out): Pioneer 10, Voyager 1, and Voyager 2. One of these days one of them will cross the termination shock, the last vestibule of our solar system, marking the first time a spacecraft has left the solar system and entered interstellar space. That event will be truly newsworthy, but too many people believe we already did that almost 20 years ago!
Another more serious colossal error, which did not involve the news media, but instead personnel and contractors working with NASA, occurred on January 28, 1986, with the launch of Space Shuttle Challenger. 73 seconds after the launch the shuttle exploded with 7 astronauts aboard. The astronauts were killed, not by the explosion itself, but by the impact of the shuttle hitting the ocean 10 miles down from the site of the explosion. The shuttle was launched despite the repeated strong disagreement of engineers at Morton-Thiokol, the maker of the solid-rocket booster for the shuttle. The explosion occurred when the seal of an O-ring in that booster failed because the shuttle was launched at much lower temperatures than the ring had been tested at. The momentous push to go ahead with the mission won, and the shuttle and its 7 astronauts were tragically lost.
I would like to dedicate this newsletter in memory of those astronauts, on the 15th year anniversary of their untimely deaths. It seems so fitting to remember them on these first days of the new century. Because of the colossal error resulting in this momentous tragedy, no space mission could be launched for the next 3 years, and NASA ended its quite-flawed policy of launching all new space-missions from the space shuttle. This flawed policy resulted in delaying missions like the Galileo mission to Jupiter by almost a decade, and was primarily responsible for the failure of its large antenna for transmission of data back to Earth. Much progress has been made in clearing up these problems, readying NASA for much greater developments in space for the 21st century. While this is a small consolation for their loss, on this 15th anniversary of their deaths they can be viewed as bold pioneers deserving the highest in praise for their venture.
Wired systems everywhere are going wireless. Wireless cellular mobile phones are being replaced by global PCS phones. Clusters of satellites like the 48-satellite Globestar cluster are being developed for PCS uses. In 2-3 years wireless internet connections to all parts of the globe will become possible.
Two satellite systems to support global wireless internet that are being developed are iSky (formally K-Star) and Teledesic. iSky has 4 "master" satellites in geosynchronous orbit out at 21,000 miles as well as many low-Earth orbiting satellites, whereas Teledesic is designed to have 288 or more satellites in low-Earth orbit. Big-money backers like Bill Gates are behind Teledesic.
There are about 9,000 satellites in orbit around Earth, and soon there will be many more. Currently there are over 25,000 objects in orbit around the Earth, and much of it is "space junk" that has developed from past spacecraft. We are rapidly populating Earth's neighborhood with satellites, and have created what I call a SuperGlobe structure running from Earth's surface out to 21,000 miles. The volume of this SuperGlobe is almost 30 times as large as the volume of Earth itself, and exhibits the vast expansian of human interaction into the third dimension (i.e. radially from the Earth. This SuperGlobe is our sphere of existence, and our dependence on this sphere will continually increase in the future as humanity progresses.
All of these satellites on which we are continually increasing our dependence are out of atmosphere, so they are independent of local weather. However, they vulnerable to what has become known as "space weather". A new science has arisen to develop means of making accurate forecasts on the space conditions in the Earth's neighborhood from observation and measurements of conditions that arise at the Sun. If accurate forecasts can be made, sensitive instruments on these satellites can be shut down to avoid damage and destruction. X-ray and gamma rays and other energetic particles from the Sun can be very damaging to unprotected satellite instruments.
A case for the importance of space weather is the January, 1997 solar flare that occurred in proxity to the launch of the AT&T Telestar 401 Satellite, leading to its total failure. Satellites costs can easily run more than $100 million, so that failure was quite a large monetary loss. Being able forecast that danger would have led to abortion of the launching and protected the satellite. The basic goal of space weather forecasting is to predict conditions on Earth that happen several hours after phenomena like flares, prominences and even sunspots develop on the Sun, so that protective measures can be taken to avoid the destruction of sensitive instruments, as well as the interference with intended functions (e.g. communication), on those satellites. Survival of the SuperGlobe depends upon the development of space weather prediction to help in that protection.
In addition to the thousands of spacecraft orbiting the Earth, many others have been sent out to explore rest of the solar system. We have gone out over 20 billion miles with the 3 spacecraft mentioned before that will one day enter into interstellar space, but we still have a communication link with them. Transmission between from these spacecraft to Earth takes about 30 hours. They are not in orbit about the Sun, as their speed is much greater than its escape velocity. They are in orbit about the galaxy. Thus they will be back, but not for over 200 million years!
So at dawn of this 21st century and 3rd millenium, our state is that (1) Wireless communication, everywhere from telephones to internet around the, is going global (2) Weather forecasting is going solar, and (3) The outer reaches of exploration is going galactic. Humans are actively interacting with their solar neighborhood, and this activity will increase dramatically in the next few years. In fact, our vital dependence on both Earth the Sun and much in between the means we must deal with that neighborhood. That is especially true with our emerging SuperGlobe which humanity is becoming vitally dependent on.
Our SuperGlobe is just a tiny piece of our solar-terrestrial neighborhood. That neighborhood is just a small corner of our solar system, and yet our solar system is just one of billions of stellar systems in our galaxy. And our galaxy is just one of billions of galaxies in the Universe. This SuperGlobe is the growing home for humanity in the Universe. For the new century and the new millenium let use use scientific advances in protection, as well as developments promoting international peace and harmony, to keep it that way.
Crockett Grabbe
"SeaLane Gray"
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