NASA gets two military spy telescopes for astronomy
Baku, June 8 (AZERTAC). The secretive government agency that flies spy satellites has made a stunning gift to NASA: two exquisite telescopes as big and powerful as the Hubble Space Telescope. The telescopes were built by private contractors for the National Reconnaissance Office, one of 16 U.S. intelligence agencies. The telescopes have 2.4-meter (7.9-foot) mirrors, just like the Hubble, but they have 100 times the field of view. Their structure is shorter and squatter. They`re “space qualified,” as NASA puts it, but they`re a long way from being functioning space telescopes. They have no instruments — there are no cameras, for example. More than that, they lack a funded mission and all that entails, such as a scientific program, support staff, data analysis and office space. They will remain in storage while NASA mulls its options.
The announcement Monday raised the obvious question of why the intelligence agency would no longer want, or need, two Hubble-class telescopes. A spokeswoman, Loretta DeSio, provided information sparingly. The telescopes have been declassified, though they remain sufficiently sensitive that neither the NRO or NASA would provide a photograph of them. At a presentation to scientists Monday in Washington, Alan Dressler, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science, showed an image of one of the telescopes, but it was so thoroughly blacked out — redacted for national security reasons — that the audience burst into laughter. The two NRO telescopes may be versions of the KH-11 Kennan satellites that the agency has been putting into orbit since 1976, according to a space analyst familiar with both civilian and military hardware. NASA has a plan for such a telescope, called the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST). But the program has effectively been put on hold because of the dismal state of the space agency`s science budget. It`s not scheduled to launch until 2018, more than four years past the original launch target, and its projected cost is nearing $9 billion. WFIRST was envisioned as a much less expensive telescope with a relatively modest light-collecting mirror, just 1.5 meters (4.9 feet). One of the new NRO telescopes, with a bigger mirror, would give WFIRST an upgrade in capability.
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