Talk:Blackstar (spaceplane)

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[edit] Space Daily reference

This needs to be brought into context. It's easy for a nothing media outlet such as Space Daily to point fingers at one of the big boys of aerospace media (AW&ST.) —Joseph/N328KF (Talk) 12:58, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I did note a few errors in the Spacedaily article and mentioned them here. Is there any other context that isn't provided by linking to Aviation Week & Space Technology and Spacedaily? Benabik 13:13, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that more than a one-liner about spacedaily belongs in the opening section, and instead we should have a "reaction to the story" section, which had a few sentences about SpaceDaily, mentions of other media outlets that picked up the story, and (perhaps) a reaction to SpaceDaily. I'm feel rather more comfortable if the text we have about the SpaceDaily article (including any corrections or refutations of it) themselves being sourced. If SpaceDaily isn't a terribly reliable source (I don't know anything about it) then the best thing we can do is only briefly mention it (and not bother refuting it). One thing I've realised when working on article, such as this, which are briefly in the white-heat of events - that we'll all forget about the article soon enough (I don't expect to see a Blackstar in the Smithsonian any time soon) and that when viewed in a few months the detailing of arguments between aviation journalists will seem rather trivial (and all the moreso if the Government does announce Blackstar). Like most articles, our coverage of the controversy should be broad and shallow. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 13:42, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I know just enough about this sort of stuff to get in trouble, but not to respond to the SpaceDaily article. I thought about adding a response section, but could only add one or two sentences about obvious mistakes and didn't want to add such a small section. But I didn't like having a link to an article with obvious (to me at least) errors without comment. I don't know about the reliability of the site so can't comment on that, but pretty much otherwise agree with you Finlay. Benabik 00:02, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] about Jeff Bell's article

I would like to point out what I believe is a misunderstanding of a point Jeff Bell made about the laser on the imagery payload described in the Blackstar article of Aviation Week. He does not suggest that the laser is used as a weapon. What he explaines is that for the laser to be used in conjuction with the adaptive optics it has to be fired towards the object to be imaged. This laser is no weapon, but it is used to calibrate the adaptive optics in order to account for atmospheric effects. Even if the laser is not visible, a potential targets may notice that a laser is being pointed at them. That is why Jeff Bell suggests that it makes little sense to use that type of equipment for imaging.

In addition, a clear difference should be made between suborbital flight, such as the type Tier One has achieved and orbital flight, which is what in the Aviation Week story it is said that Blackstar achieves.

Unless new evidence is presented, Jeff's rebuttal of the original article is conclusive.

[edit] Vortex

I heard years ago that this vehicle visited a satellite named Vortex which has huge antenna farms attached.

Supercool Dude 23:02, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Who the hell is Dr. Day?