At the height of the Cold War, the United States military feared that a single Soviet act of sabotage against undersea cables could plunge the West into total communication silence.
Their solution was as audacious as it was controversial: Project West Ford.
In the early nineteen-sixties, the US Air Force launched four hundred and eighty million copper needles into orbit to create a man-made ionosphere - a ring around the Earth that would act as a permanent radio reflector.
This is the story of how millions of tiny dipoles, each no longer than a postage stamp, were meant to secure global communications against a nuclear strike.
We explore the incredible engineering behind the orbital dispensers, the fierce international backlash from astronomers - including many in the United Kingdom - and the enduring legacy of the thousands of "needles" that remain in orbit today. It is a fascinating chapter of space history that blurs the line between brilliant innovation and orbital pollution.
