Jed Rothwell wrote:
I researched plutonium powered radioisotope thermoelectric generators
(RTG) for the book chapter 2. As far as I know, there have only been
~24 US spacecraft equipped with RTG, and telecom satellites are not
among them. See, for example this document, written in 1984:
http://science.howstuffworks.com/framed.htm?parent=question136.htm&url=http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/messenger/oldmess/RTGs.html
And this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generators
As noted here, the Apollo 13 RTG was supposed to be left on the moon,
but the vehicle reentered and burned up over Fiji. The RTG remained
intact and ended up in the Tonga trench in the Pacific Ocean. (How
they found it I cannot imagine.)
Ed Storms is an expert on this subject.
- Jed
Each RTG is impact armoured to survive impact with the water and stay
sealed. They have a radio transmitter and a sonar beacon that will
probablely still be gowing beep decades from now given the power source.
I believe they may have a dye release system that marks the splashdown
point. Given the trenches depth I suspect it will only be a few years
before someone retreaves the RTG with an ROV. It would be quite safe if
you put it in a lead glass box and keep oxygen away from anything that
might rust. Any bit of an apollo mission would be worth its weight in gold.
