Lunar Eclipse

Ladies and Gents, it's that time of decade again. There will be a Lunar Eclipse on Feb. 20th. For me, this is fortunate, as that is my squadron's Aerospace Education night. Mark your calendars, this is something to see, and teach about too.

Harrison Ford: Pilot

Firstly, Happy New Year! First post of 2008.

And now, onto our regular...er....semi-regularly scheduled programming.

Ever since I was 5 and saw Star Wars for the first time I always thought Harrison Ford was the man. Of course, it's been many years since then, and the actor has had many flops in the past few years. I was on youtube last night, and I found this video of him talking about his flight experience. I know it echos my own feelings towards flight, and I imagine that it does for many others.



It should be noted that the actor offers his services as a helicopter pilot to Teton County Search and Rescue; one of them is chronicled on wikipedia. Additionally, Ford is the chairman of EAA's Young Eagles.


Another Note: I have not had a chance yet to upload the picture from my last post. My scanner has been broken since late-november. I will post it when I have an opportunity.

Gyros, please

I got my first issue of AOPA Pilot about 2 weeks ago. Although I have been a member for 2 years, I have been receiving AOPA Flight Training instead. I opened it up to find many good articles on many different topics. I particularly enjoyed the article on Aerial Firefighting (Hot Shots, pg 104); but the article that stands out most in my mind is the one on Gyroplane (Old Dog, New Trick, pg 143). You remember these things? Has a rotor on top and and a regular prop in front? Maybe has a pair of short, stubby wings?

Apparently, they're starting to make a comeback. It's understandable, because according to the arcticle they only cost $20 per hour to operate; 1/5 of the cost of the C-172 on a good day and at a cheap FBO. Additionally, the gyroplane doesn't stall, making it safer than a helicopter. There is no tail rotor, because the aircraft uses something called autorotation to power the blades. The principal is similar to those toys you can buy for kids; if you drop the rotor, it begins to spin and slow the descent. Because it is driven by air, it does not produce torque. Although there are rudders, they are not needed for turns because "there is no adverse yaw" as the article says. The Groen Brothers' Website has an excellent description on how these things work)

The article cites one modern, law enforcement gyrocopter: the Hawk 4 Gyroplane. The Hawk 4 apparently saw service during the 2002 winter olympics, and was a huge success. The aircraft's cousin, the Hawk 5's specs are online, and looks to be comporable to a 172 in terms of cruise speed and cost. Maybe something to consider?

Information for this article taken from "Old Dog, New Trick: The gyroplane is half-airplane, half-helicopter and 100 percent fun" by Patrick R. Veillette; AOPA Pilot, October 2007 issue.

UPDATE: I found this video on youtube that I figure is worth sharing:

Ahead, Full Impulse.

Another entry in the Aerospace Journals.

TUSTIN, Calif., Sept. 7, 2007 -- An amplified photon thruster that could potentially shorten the trip to Mars from six months to a week has reportedly attracted the attention of aerospace agencies and contractors.

Young Bae, founder of the Bae Institute in Tustin, Calif., first demonstrated his photonic laser thruster (PLT), which he built with off-the-shelf components, in December.

The demonstration produced a photon thrust of 35 µN and is scalable to achieve much greater thrust for future space missions, the institute said. Applications include highly precise satellite formation flying configurations for building large synthetic apertures in space for earth or space observation, precision contaminant-free spacecraft docking operations, and propelling spacecraft to unprecedented speeds -- faster than 100 km/sec.

“This is the tip of the iceberg," Bae said in a statement from the institute. "PLT has immense potential for the aerospace industry. For example, PLT-powered spacecraft could transit the 100 million km to Mars in less than a week.”

Bae founded the institute to develop space technologies and has pursued concepts such as photon, antimatter and fusion propulsion for more than 20 years at SRI International, Brookhaven National Lab and the Air Force Research Lab. He has a PhD in atomic and nuclear physics from UC Berkeley.

Several aerospace organizations have expressed interest in collaborating with the institute to further develop and integrate PLT into civilian, military and commercial space systems, Bae said, and he has recently been invited to present his work by NASA, JPL, DARPA and the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL).

So I watched a little too much Star Trek in middle school, that's not the point. Clearly worth a mention in your next Aerospace briefing.

Ad Astra, per Aspera

I ran across this today:

GOLDEN, Colo. - Silicon Valley giant Google Inc. is teaming with the X Prize Foundation to launch a commercial race to the Moon with $30 million in incentives to collect along the way.

The X Prize Foundation, headquartered in Santa Monica, Calif., spearheaded the $10 million Ansari X Prize, which was created to jumpstart the development of private commercial transportation to suborbital space. That prize was won by Scaled Composites of California, which is now building a commercial version of its winning vehicle for entrepreneur Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic Corp.

The Google Lunar X Prize sets the competition bar much higher than suborbital space.

"This next major X Prize has a mission that goes far beyond suborbital flight, and extends the economic sphere of humanity 10 times farther beyond geostationary Earth orbit ... all the way to the Moon," said Peter Diamandis, the X Prize Foundation's chairman and chief executive officer. "This competition will once again demonstrate that small teams of dedicated individuals can do what was once thought viable only by governments."

The goal of the new prize will be to land a privately funded robotic rover on the Moon that is capable of completing several mission objectives, such as: roaming the lunar surface to a distance of at least 1,640 feet (500 meters) and relaying video, images and data back to Earth.

It seems as though Buzz Aldrin has endorsed the program, appearing with the leader of the project on an Associated Press video. The trailer for "In the Shadow of the Moon" said that "it was a time when we did bold things" with regards to the original moon landings. Lets do something bold again.

(10 points to whoever can guess what the title means!)