[Fwd: Poor Reporting]

[Robert Jackson <High.Seas@breezy.com>]

Dib9 wrote in part:
> 
> Most of the stories about the satellite that went out of control have said
> that as a result of the problem, 80% of the pagers in the country do not work.
> This is not really true.  Most pagers work off a local or regional network of
> towers and the satellites.....
>..... The only story that I have heard that got this right was during the noon news
> from NPR, but even in that case, the headlines read by the Maine Public Radio
> reporter going in to the news said that 80% of pagers nationally were not
> working.
> 
> Dan Billings
> Bowdoinham, Maine
- -------------------------
....and the phrase "spinning out of control" that was used might be 
a little over-done. I cannot be absolutely certain because I have never
come across the specs for the Galaxy-4 system, but doubtless it
is in a geo-sync. orbit - motionless relative to the earth's surface -  
"parked" thousands of miles above the equator - and not in a *low 
earth-orbit* that we normally associate with satellite velocities
in the range of 17,000 to 18,000 mph.- and for those obsolete objects
in decaying orbits, that are truly rolling or spinning with no control.

But, there is a virtual flotilla of communications hardware in geo-sync.
orbit that, with the exception of predictable rare sun-earth alignments, 
operate flawlessly most of the time. A 'nudge' of one of these
high-flying 
birds must be a mighty unusual event, I would think.

Bob J.
- ---

------------------------------