Wheels on the Bus Will Be Flying Round and Round Hundreds of Miles across the Stratosphere

This has been relativly "big" news across the American media lately. An old US spy sattelite was launched in 2006 and shortly died after. The sattelite contains hydrazine fuel, a very toxic material that could cause some harm if it were to crash land back onto the Earth. The Pentagon has been called in to shoot down the sattelite with an experimental missile program designed to shoot down short to medium ranged ICBM (Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile) from future rogue states that may acquire nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction.

The SM-3 missile will be launched either this evening or within three days (I believe) to down the rocket. The Pentagon has called on an Aegis class destroyer to fire the missile and down the old sattelite as it begins to re-enter orbit. The Pentagon has a backup plan (2 more missiles) but the United States stated that it will repay damages for harm caused if the sattelite lands in another country. This has never been done in real life before, however simulations and other tests proved the system to be successful. The SM-3 missile was developed as an answer to a missile defense shield against North Korea.

There is debate over whether the United States is doing this to show off it's new systems and/or to send a message to rogue states as well as other countries. In my opinion I think the timing of this sattelite falling out of it's orbit is purely coincidental. It may send a message to other countries, however the United States has a responsibility to shoot down this sattelite before it causes any harm to anyone or anything. When hit, if hit, the sattelite will explode into pieces, hopefully the hydrazine fuel tank along with it. It is expected that the remainder of the debris will burn up upon re-entry.

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