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Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!David.Smith@CMU-CS-IUS
From: David.Smith@CMU-CS-IUS@sri-unix.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: none
Message-ID: <3501@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 27-Jul-83 10:36:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.3501
Posted: Wed Jul 27 10:36:40 1983
Date-Received: Mon, 1-Aug-83 04:43:14 EDT
Lines: 13

I remember reading about the orbiting needle experiment in the NASA booklet
"Space - The New Frontier" in around 1962-3.  I forget the name of the
project.  The idea was to girdle the Earth with a ring of copper needles
cut to the right length, and use it for reflecting radio communications.
I think it was a Navy project.

A few years ago, I read (I don't remember where) that the experiment had
been carried out over the loud protests of radio astronomers.  It was a
failure, but turned out not to interfere with radio telescopes, either.
The needles all burned up in the atmosphere in a few years.

A ring of needles is just what we need to compete for space with spacecraft
and skyhooks.