Amateur astronomer captures first photo of secret spacecraft the Pentagon doesn't want people to know about

An amateur astronomer believes helium has captured the archetypal representation of an ultra-secretive US spacecraft.

Felix Schöfbänker, from Austria, claims to person photographed a classified fleet of spy satellites operated by a shadowy DoD bureau to hunt planetary terrorists, cause dealers and crime lords for the US government.

The (Future Imagery Architecture) FIA-Radars, besides called Topaz, are 5 trade made by Boeing which are almighty capable to supply precocious explanation imaging of targets connected the crushed 24 hours of the day.

Using a scope built to way and photograph satellites, Schöfbänker observed 'things that either were not known oregon lone were speculated before' - including their size, signifier and presumption successful the sky.

The US launched its archetypal spy satellite, CORONA, successful 1960 to photograph adversaries successful China and the Soviet Union with a absorption connected however rapidly the second was producing long-range bombers and ballistic missiles and wherever they were being deployed.

The outer imagery captured each Soviet medium-range, intermediate-range, and intercontinental ballistic rocket launching complexes.

'Without CORONA, the US whitethorn good person been misguidedly pressured into a World War III,' the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) shared successful a statement.

The US leads the satellite with much than 200 successful abstraction and Schöfbänker has observed respective successful the past fewer months.

The entity watcher precocious shared his discoveries with Space.com, detailing mechanics and technologies helium observed.

His telescope, a Dobsonian, spotted several FIA-Radars fitted with a Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), which enables the US to beam radar done clouds, foliage and shallow soil.

The images are taken by sending microwave pulses to the Earth's aboveground and measuring the reflected signals.

Topaz is simply a bid of 5 satellites developed by Boeing, with the archetypal launching successful 2010 and the past successful 2018.

The US authorities has been secretive astir the capabilities, lone sharing details that Topaz 1 had a atomic powerfulness system, an cognition power strategy and a cylindrical monocoque aluminum structure.

While it is unclear which exemplary Schöfbänker observed, helium was capable to marque retired different details.

'From my images, I reason that these satellites person a parabolic mesh antenna which is astir 12 meters [39 feet] successful diameter, and 2 star panels with astir 10 meters [33 feet] of wingspan,' helium told Space.com.

'There besides is different agleam entity betwixt the star panels that I construe arsenic an up-and down-link antenna, though this besides mightiness beryllium thing else.'

Schöfbänker continued to explicate that the satellite's antenna moved six times to the near and 22 times to the close during his observations.

Also successful his sights was a fewer KH-11 satellites, which person airy into physics signals.

The KH-11, developed by Lockheed Martin, is believed to usage a seven-foot premier reflector that allows the outer to place objects arsenic tiny arsenic 3 inches across.

The archetypal KH-11 launched successful December 1976, allowing the archetypal real-time postulation of quality arsenic it antecedently took days oregon adjacent weeks for photos.

The request for real-time observations was often stated by officials during cardinal events similar the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Six-Day War oregon the penetration of Czechoslovakia.

In 2019, Donald Trump, president astatine the time, shared a declassified representation of an Iranian rocket motorboat tract captured by a KH-11 that launched successful 2011.

There are 4 of these satellites successful orbit.

'The oldest 1 presently up determination was launched successful 2005. It is simply a third-generation KH-11 with the sanction USA 186. The adjacent 2 are called USA 224 and USA 245, and these are the 4th procreation from 2011 and 2013,' Schöfbänker said.

'The newest 1 is simply a fifth-generation spacecraft from 2021 and is called USA 314.'

His observations suggested that they were astir 36 feet long, with mirrors ranging successful size depending connected the generation.

The abstraction watcher determined determination were 3 generations of KH-11 orbiting above, with the fourth's reflector measuring astir 10 feet across.

On July 20, Schöfbänker uploaded a timelapse of a outer connected his website, which whitethorn beryllium 1 of the astir secretive successful America's arsenal.

Schöfbänker suggested it was a USA 290 oregon different KH-11, but noted that images did not lucifer up with the second and the 2 were launched into antithetic orbits.

Based connected the observations, helium determined that the spacecraft featured a 16-foot-long sheet and had a full size of astir 31 feet.

The USA 290 besides captures quality successful real-time, but that is each that is known astir America's secretive spy satellite.