385 Feet of Crazy: The Most Audacious Flying Machine

Re:385 Feet of Crazy: The Most Audacious Flying Machine by mikeash on Thursday August 23, 2018 @06:43PM (#17831221)

Is that a fundamental limit, or just how they’re currently built because they don’t need to do anything better?

I don’t know a whole lot about spy satellites, but the existence of things like spy planes and accurate ICBMs suggests the latter.

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Re:385 Feet of Crazy: The Most Audacious Flying Machine by sandworm101 on Thursday August 23, 2018 @07:26PM (#17831438)

For small sats in low orbit it can be a very big deal. Before you can start snapping pictures accurately you need to confirm the actual orbit. You let the thing whip by a couple times to confirm its speed and altitude. Then it will likely be spinning a little. You need to wait for the aerodynamic forces to smooth that out.

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