Talk:Range safety

Merger Proposal 2011. Done, RSO merged in
I have renominated Range Safety Officer to be merged with Range safety. It was originally nominated in August by User:WDGraham. I believe it should be merged to the Range Safety article, since this article is about the range safety officer, who is part of the range safety system.-- Navy Blue84  19:57, 26 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Support, my position is unchanged. Given how long the nomination has already been open, I would advise that you just go ahead and do it. -- W.  D.   Graham  (previously GW) 20:06, 26 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Agreed WD! Since it has really been nominated since August, and there is no further discussion going on, I will close it and perform the merge.-- Navy Blue84  14:30, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Range Safety to First Stage Ascent
This line " and the job of the RSO ends when the missile or vehicle moves out of range and is no longer a threat to any sea or land area (after completing First Stage Ascent)" is incorrect and the cited reference is a space shuttle only reference. The range tracks until orbital insertion and in some cases, also upon re-entry. I don't have references for these which is why I'm putting it into the talk page.Freakdog (talk) 02:41, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Non-global point of view?
I went ahead and removed the Globalize tag, because I couldn't figure out how this article is being unfair to other nations' idea of range safety. If anyone has access to information about how other nations handle it, go ahead and add it. JustinTime55 (talk) 16:30, 12 September 2014 (UTC)


 * The idea of the globalize tag is to request of editors expansion of coverage of other points-of-view from a global perspective. It says nothing about the fairness of the treatment of other nations in this article.


 * This article, as it stands, is quite US centric, where nearly the only detail provided is for US launches? How is range safety handled in Russia, India, ESA, Japan, etc.?  Do they have armed explosives on each orbital launch as the vehicle leaves the pad?  Who "owns" or runs the launch vehicle "safety" process and makes the decision on when it is time to fail the vehicle?  Is the government?  The commercial operator? Etc., but from a more global and less-US perspective.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 18:41, 12 September 2014 (UTC)


 * I disagree. The template most definitely does imply WP:systemic bias, which implies unfairness. Simple lack of information about other countries does not, in and of itself, show proof of this bias. The goal should be to motivate editors to add information about other countries, and there is a better way to do it (such as Template:Missing information). Check the Template Usage Notes from the documentation:


 * This tag should only be applied to articles where global perspectives are reasonably believed to exist (e.g., that people in China have a different view about ... [in this case, range safety. Oh, wait a minute, maybe they do... :-) ]
 * If additional reliable sources for a worldwide view cannot be found after a reasonable search, this tag may be removed.
 * This tag should not be used as a badge of shame ... [ of course, this is boilerplate for all tags ]
 * Please explain your concerns on the article's talk page and link to the section title of the discussion you initiate. Otherwise, other editors may remove this tag with alacrity and justified prejudice.
 * Our good friend WDGraham seems to be the one who added it, with no discussion. Sure, the article could be improved with information from other nations, but where is it? I think we should replace the tag with "Missing information". JustinTime55 (talk) 19:12, 12 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I'm agnostic about which tag is better/ideal for the purpose. I do think the article very much needs a more global perspective on range safety, as do you, and as does (apparently, thanks for the research) WDG.  So I think we are all (or mostly) on the same page here.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 01:56, 13 September 2014 (UTC)


 * I think we differ on the meaning of "global perspective", as it is defined for the purposes of this template. Read the sentence from the usage notes above: do different nations have different ideas about range safety, whether or not it's important, how important it is, whose responsibility it is, etc? (I don't know if anyone caught my wikilink to the Intelsat 708 disaster above, but I was being a bit of a smart-alec. We don't really want to go there, do we?)
 * I consider that something completely different from the fact that they might implement it in different ways. And of course, all of this is just speculation on our part, absent the information about other nations' range safety programs. JustinTime55 (talk) 16:27, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Well, one year on after the above discussion, the article still would be much improved to have a perspective on how "range safety" with rocket launches is or is not handled in other nations beside the US. I get that we have a lot more sources on what's going on in the US; but clearly the tags on the article asking for improvement are, still yet, appropriate. N2e (talk) 05:58, 3 December 2015 (UTC)


 * It could be v interesting to add the Chinese and Russian range safety rules. - Rod57 (talk) 11:06, 12 April 2022 (UTC)

Non-rocket applications
Some of the same concepts are used for research aircraft without a pilot aboard (remotely piloted or autonomous). A "range" is a controlled-access region used for hazardous testing (often of weapons systems). Range safety strives to contain the hazards to the region.104.173.68.20 (talk) 20:20, 1 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Missiles, especially cruise missiles, have guidance, do they need range safety systems ? We can use a hatnote here to exclude military firing range (Tanks, rifles, artillery) safety ? - Rod57 (talk) 11:10, 12 April 2022 (UTC)