THINGS THAT MAKE YOU GO “HMMMM…”: SPACE STATION TO GET LASER CANNON
File this one under “things that make you go ‘hmmm…’”: it seems that the International Space Station is to be the proud recipient of its very own special laser cannon:Space Station to Get a ‘Laser Cannon’
Now, the article makes a couple of things clear, namely, that this laser cannon is purely for environmental research, and that it will operate at a power output far too low to be used for any “funny monkey-military” business:
“Developed by research scientist Matt McGill at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt Maryland, CATS is slated to head to the International Space Station later this year on September 12th aboard SpaceX’s CRS-5 flight of the Dragon spacecraft. CATS will be installed on the Japanese Experiment Module-Exposed Facility (JEM-EF) and will demonstrate the utility of state-of-the-art multi-wavelength laser technology to study aerosol distribution and transport in the atmosphere.The admissions make perfect sense, nor would one expect that the international space station would even have the power generating requirements to operate a laser much bigger than this, and certainly not one with any sort of military capability…
“Such knowledge is critical in understanding the path and circulation of aerosols and pollutants worldwide. When the Eyjafjallajökull volcano erupted in Iceland back in 2010, many trans-Atlantic flights were grounded as a precaution. These measures are necessary as several flights have suffered engine failures in the past due to encounters with volcanic ash clouds, such as the four engine failure of KLM Fight 867 in 1989 and the British Airways Flight 9 incident over Southeast Asia in 1982. Knowing where these dangerous ash clouds are is crucial to the safety of air travel.
…
“To accomplish this, CATS will emit 5,000 1 milliJoule laser pulses a second at the 1064, 532 and 355 nanometer wavelengths. This represents a vast improvement in power requirements and thermal capabilities over a similar instrument currently in service aboard the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) Earth remote sensing spacecraft.”(Emphasis added)
…if we’re being told the truth…
It’s that possibility that makes me entertain some of my usual high octane speculation here. First of all, it’s interesting that this announcement comes more or less contemporaneously with that curious video of an alleged UFO near the space station. Now, like many of you, I suspect the video is photoshopped at best, or that it’s not entirely the genuine article at worst. More importantly, however, this little announcement comes at a time when there is much talk on the internet about asteroid mining, lunar mining, and even – if one is following the Russians carefully – comments from Russian politicians about the need for an asteroid defense system(which occurred, you’ll recall, prior to the strange Chelyabinsk bollide showed up and blew up – or was blown up – in the skies of Russia).
It’s the context, in other words, that suggests to me that something wider may be going on, that, perhaps, “we need lasers in space and we need them there now.” The question would be, how do we get them up there? One way is to create a climate of opinion, and another is simply to misinform the public of the true purposes, and power, of such devices. The bottom line here folks, one that I think is worth watching, is to see if this move is followed up by further calls or projects for “environmental study lasers” in space… after all, this is NASA – Never A Straight Answer – that we’re dealing with.
Oh…and by the way, one last little thought… a nice low power laser would be the perfect sort of thing for targeting and tracking purposes…
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