http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/02/that-satellite.html Wired says that USA-193 was part of the Future Imagery Architecture project which has produced some of the most spectacular cost overruns in military history, but precious few working satellites. Seems that Boeing won the contract over Lockheed, despite having little or no experience building spy sats. The upshot was a lot of optics and electronics that just plain didn't work, massive (at least $625 million and maybe up to $900 million) cost overruns and just plain dumb things like using inappropriate materials for space craft. The program became "perhaps the most spectacular and expensive failure in the 50-year history of American spy satellite projects," according to the New York Times. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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