Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2013/01/20

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Subject: [Leica] Cold War Space Radars - UFOs?
From: jhnichols at lighttube.net (Jim Nichols)
Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2013 10:50:25 -0600
References: <67B24A6E-51E8-42C5-81D1-39BD87F0B007@acm.org><DD27B927-1F94-4007-BECB-1FA60F7CA23D@bex.net><CAE3QcF4s7To3bM3x4jOWtApgqFZMq4jMxExdbUVMtkRNRbEOMw@mail.gmail.com><50FA9681.3080104@gmx.de><02995148-152C-43CE-A032-48EBD017A28B@bex.net><F1E76E0E7537455CABD0DFB7CB0CB9A2@Family><EF061C4D-68DF-4CA5-809B-7683E9DBF3F7@bex.net><50FBEE53.8030308@gmx.de><4F36F120-593E-4483-B355-DE0B54091674@bex.net> <50FC1E25.80306@gmx.de>

Hi Douglas and Howard,

Looks as if many of us have a connection there.  My oldest son, a computer 
systems analyst, spent some time there for his employer, in the early 1980s.

Jim Nichols
Tullahoma, TN USA
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Douglas Sharp" <douglas.sharp at gmx.de>
To: "Leica Users Group" <lug at leica-users.org>
Sent: Sunday, January 20, 2013 10:41 AM
Subject: Re: [Leica] Cold War Space Radars - UFOs?


> Howard,
>
> I have actually walked past it at night - outside the perimeter fence. 
> It's on the route of the old corpse way, which has been a long-distance 
> walk for many years - The Lyke Wake Walk - a competitive and very tough 
> walk that has to be finished within 24 hours. There used to be a little 
> badge in the form of a coffin for everyone who completed it. It certainly 
> looked eerie looming out of the mist in the twilight.
>
> The spookiest things along the walk are stumbling over a sheep in pitch 
> darkness, or the loud squawks when you blunder into a nest of grouse!
> That said, I would never have thought of walking it alone.
>
> There have been cases of walkers inadvertently trespassing on the site, 
> being arrested by RAF police with big dogs (now patrolled by a private 
> security force), having been questioned, "invited" to sign the Official 
> Secrets Act, and then being dropped off at the main gate after an 
> excellent breakfast. (not exactly reaction with "extreme prejudice)
>
> One story even involves a bus full of pensioners that got lost in the fog 
> and ended up between the golfballs - probably as believable as 
> UFO-sightings.:-)
>
> Apparently, the new pyramid has 360? radar that covers everything (still 
> including Russia, but now also the Middle East and N. Africa), but 
> concentrates mainly on locating orbiting junk.
>
> Interesting is that the base is not marked on the Ordnance Survey maps of 
> the UK (at least not on the 1977 issue). But is very clearly marked on 
> Russian maps of the same period.
>
> As far as I know, the most important "spy" site in the area is Menwith 
> Hill, the "Ear to the Sky" which, according to local hearsay, monitors 
> international phone, e-mail and Internet traffic - purportedly for the 
> NSA - is a part of the ECHELON System, and may even be involved in the 
> control of drone attacks.
>
> But, as ever, all you have to do is put a high fence around it, put up 
> unambiguous signs and post armed guards, and you already have the next 
> conspiracy theory.:-)
>
> Cheers
> Douglas
>
>
> On 20.01.2013 15:53, Howard Ritter wrote:
>> Douglas?
>>
>> Thanks for the interesting information about the Yorkshire moors. Must 
>> have been spooky to work at at Fylingdales?especially at night!
>>
>> Actually, there was nothing particularly secret about these 
>> installations. They were just radar stations using technology developed 
>> in the 1950s and '60s. They sent their data to a central facility called 
>> the CC&DF inside Cheyenne Mountain south of Colorado Springs (which was 
>> my last duty station in this system, before I changed gears by going to 
>> medical school). Now, the newer installation you mentioned sounds like a 
>> phased-array radar, which steers the beam electronically and can 
>> generated multiple beams simultaneously; there's maybe some classified 
>> technology there.
>>
>> The more nuanced answer to your question about unidentified objects is 
>> that we would not likely have recognized one if we'd seen it! The 
>> system's mission was to look for space objects with ballistic (i.e., 
>> free-fall) trajectories that were either a closed orbit (satellite) or 
>> one that intersected the surface of the Earth (as an ICBM warhead would 
>> do). Objects with none of these conditions were ignored, and in any case 
>> only data relating to position, velocity, and intensity of the radar 
>> reflection were generated; a radar doesn't produce an image. Moreover, 
>> the radar was programmed to ignore anything closer to it than a satellite 
>> in low Earth orbit, say 90 miles or so. Alien spacecraft traveling under 
>> power in the atmosphere would be ignored by the computer as being 
>> aircraft and/or too close to be a threat object, and one traveling under 
>> power in near-Earth space would be ignored as not being ballistic. Such a 
>> thing would have shown up on-screen (as a computer-generated blip, not an 
>> image), but the data would have been discarded as being irrelevant. An 
>> alien craft actually on orbit, like a satellite, and generating a strong 
>> reflection, WOULD generate data that would be saved and sent to the CC&DF 
>> for analysis, and would lead to the generation of a new-satellite file. 
>> Such an unexpected finding would have prompted an extreme-priority 
>> designation that would have tasked the sites to gather maximum data on it 
>> every pass. When it moved on, out of orbit, disappearing suddenly without 
>> "decaying" due to atmospheric friction, this would have generated extreme 
>> consternation. I never heard of any such object. Even new Soviet 
>> satellites were known about virtually as soon as they were launched, and 
>> nothing I was aware of generated the level of intense interest that the 
>> sudden appearance of a sizable, previously unknown object in orbit would 
>> have. Of course, there are lots of bits of space junk originating from 
>> exploding fuel tanks, the occasional collision, etc., many thereby driven 
>> into new orbits, and so small as to be marginally or irregularly 
>> detectable, that are monitored without their origin ever being 
>> identified.
>>
>> Of course, such aliens would presumably be highly capable of evading 
>> detection if they wanted to. They could simply stay out of sight of 
>> radars that could detect them as unidentified orbiting objects. Or if an 
>> alien ship used technology that gave it a low radar cross-section, and 
>> were on an orbit that had characteristics typical of satellites and the 
>> rocket bodies used to launch space probes, it presumably would not 
>> occasion anything other than routine interest, nor would its appearance 
>> or disappearance be thought mysterious.
>>
>> I kept constantly hoping, though!
>>
>> ?howard
>>
>>
>> On Jan 20, 2013, at 8:17 AM, Douglas Sharp <douglas.sharp at gmx.de> 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Of course not - that's why there are thousands of entries when you 
>>> google on Fylingdales and UFO.:-)
>>>
>>> Even sightings of mysterious, panther-sized black cats, a UFO crash, 
>>> lights in the sky and everything else that seems to hang around secret 
>>> military facilities. (if it's so secret, why is it so clearly visible in 
>>> one of the most exposed areas of Yorkshire?);-)
>>>
>>> The site is built on a medieval corpse way, and the moors were always 
>>> full of will of the wisps, corpse candles, boggits, trolls and other 
>>> things that jump out and scare unsuspecting travellers - and the giant 
>>> Horcum lived not far away, he left a big hole in the ground by throwing 
>>> rocks at a rival (It's actually the end of a glacial lake, but that's 
>>> not half as spooky).
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>> Douglas
>>>
>>>
>>> On 19.01.2013 20:53, Howard Ritter wrote:
>>>> Why, none?of course!  ;-)
>>>>
>>>> ?howard
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Jan 19, 2013, at 2:05 PM, Douglas Barry <imra at iol.ie> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Fascinating stuff, Howard, but, of course, we all want to know about 
>>>>> the inexplicable, or how many likely extra-terrestrial spacecraft 
>>>>> turned up?
>>>>>
>>>>> Douglas
>>>>> _________
>>>>> Douglas Barry
>>>>> Bray, Co. Wicklow
>>>>> Republic of Ireland
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Leica Users Group.
>>>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>>
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>>
>>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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>
> 




Replies: Reply from douglas.sharp at gmx.de (Douglas Sharp) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars - UFOs?)
In reply to: Message from kanner at acm.org (Herbert Kanner) ([Leica] Another in the Computer History Museum series)
Message from hlritter at bex.net (Howard Ritter) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars)
Message from hopsternew at gmail.com (Geoff Hopkinson) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars)
Message from douglas.sharp at gmx.de (Douglas Sharp) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars)
Message from hlritter at bex.net (Howard Ritter) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars)
Message from imra at iol.ie (Douglas Barry) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars)
Message from hlritter at bex.net (Howard Ritter) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars)
Message from douglas.sharp at gmx.de (Douglas Sharp) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars - UFOs?)
Message from hlritter at bex.net (Howard Ritter) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars - UFOs?)
Message from douglas.sharp at gmx.de (Douglas Sharp) ([Leica] Cold War Space Radars - UFOs?)