Britain's oldest satellite is in the "wrong" part of space, but no one understands how it got there

Britain's oldest satellite, Skynet-1A, is now 36,000 kilometers above America. It was launched in 1969, just a few months after humans first set foot on the moon.

Skynet-1A was deployed high above the east coast of Africa to transmit communications for British troops. When the spacecraft ceased operations a few years later, gravity might have been expected to pull it even further east, over the Indian Ocean. But the half-ton military spacecraft could not have simply drifted to its current location, the BBC writes.

That is, most likely, in the mid-1970s, it was ordered to start the engines to move the satellite to the west. The question is, who was it and for what purpose was it done?

"Right now Skynet-1A is in what we call a 'gravity well' at 105 degrees West, wandering back and forth like marble at the bottom of a bowl. And unfortunately, this brings it close to other satellite traffic on a regular basis. Since it's dead, the risk is that it might bump into something. And it's still 'our' satellite, and we're still responsible for it," says space consultant Dr. Stuart Ives.

Dr. Eaves has looked through old satellite catalogs, the National Archives and spoken to satellite experts around the world, but he can find no clues as to the end-of-life behavior of Britain's oldest spacecraft.

Skynet-1A was manufactured in the United States by the now-defunct Philco Ford aerospace company and sent into space by a US Air Force Delta rocket.

"The first Skynet satellite revolutionized the UK's telecommunications capabilities, allowing London to securely communicate with British troops even in Singapore. From a technological standpoint, however, Skynet-1A was more American than British, as the United States both built and launched it," noted Dr. Aaron Bateman in a recent article on the history of the Skynet program, now in its fifth generation.

This view is confirmed by Graham Davison, who flew Skynet-1A in the early 70s from his British operations center at RAF Oakhanger in Hampshire: "Initially, the Americans controlled the satellite in orbit. They tested all of our software with their own before eventually handing control over to the RAF," said the engineer, who is now long retired.

"Essentially there was dual control, but when and why Skynet-1A might have been returned to the Americans, which seems likely, I'm afraid I don't remember," adds Davison, now in his 80s.

Rachel Hill, a doctoral student at University College London, has also been digging through the National Archives. Her readings led her to one very clever possibility.

"The Skynet team from Ockhenger went to the US Air Force satellite complex in Sunnyvale and ran Skynet during the Oakout. This was when control was temporarily transferred to the US while Ockhenger was shut down for necessary maintenance. Perhaps the move could have taken place then?" Rachel Hill suggested.

The official, albeit incomplete, Skynet-1A status logs indicate that final command was left in American hands when Ockhanger lost sight of the satellite in June 1977. But despite the fact that the satellite was then moved to its current position, it was eventually allowed to die in an inconvenient location, when in fact it should have been placed in an "orbital cemetery."

Where Skynet-1A is currently located, at 105 degrees West, an active satellite can see a piece of debris 50 kilometers away from its location up to four times a day. It may seem as if they are far apart, but at the speed at which these objects are traveling, they begin to get too close together.

The Ministry of Defense said that Skynet-1A is constantly monitored by the UK's National Space Operations Center. Other satellite operators are informed of the likelihood of a particularly close conjunction in case they need to take evasive action. However, in the end, the British government may have to consider moving the old satellite to a safer location.

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