Anduril's first satellite has night vision for catching rivals sneaking around in orbit
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The big picture: Most cameras that keep watch over Earth's orbit only work when sunlight bounces off whatever they're tracking. So when a satellite slips into the planet's shadow, it effectively vanishes for a while. Anduril now says its first satellite can follow spacecraft through those dark stretches. That could let the US military catch a rival quietly changing course at night.
Anduril-216 rode a SpaceX rideshare to orbit back in July. It's roughly the size of an oven and flies about 590 km (366 miles) up, so it spends around a third of every lap in darkness.
Oddly enough, those dark passes are when it does its best work. Its long-wave infrared sensor picks up the heat other spacecraft give off rather than the sunlight bouncing off them – Anduril says the...
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