Although many National Reconnaissance Office satellites are more than a decade old and well past their intended service lives, their signals-collection capabilities remain fairly robust, NRO Director Bruce Carlson told reporters in Washington, D.C., Sept, 15, 2011. As a result, NRO is employing them in the new role of collecting "push-to-talk radio signals out of the war zones" to help track down insurgents, he said. Here, an artist's rendition of an intelligence satellite.
Artist's illustration