A new wormy robot could help with jet engine inspections at GE Aerospace, according to an announcement this week. Sensiworm, short for “Soft ElectroNics Skin-Innervated Robotic Worm,” is the newest outgrowth in GE’s line of worm robots, which includes a “giant earthworm” for tunneling and the “Pipeworm” for...
CBI Image of the Day: The computer-laden fuselage of NASA's flying laboratory, the Galileo II, included dead-reckoning software, created by the Informatics General Corp., which was used to direct the plane's monitoring equipment for experiments, 1985.
This is the other picture by Northrop's "Todd" I mentioned yesterday. It's the N-205, which was proposed in 1958 as a trainer for the X-15 and Dyna-Soar.
While it's "just" a variant on the T-38 which is used down to this day as a more conventional supersonic jet training plane, this one is in my area of interest because of how it was to be flown. With a rocket assist, it would have done a ballistic arc up to 60+ kilometers (and almost 87 km in a later version). SPA-ACE!
The failure of Luna-25, a symptom of Russia's decline in space.
On Sunday, Roscosmos announced the loss of its probe, which was due to reach the Moon's south pole in the coming days. It is another setback for Russian space exploration.
Russia’s robot lander the Luna-25 spacecraft crashed into the moon after it had spun into uncontrolled orbit, the country’s space agency Roscosmos reported on Sunday.
“The apparatus moved into an unpredictable orbit and ceased to exist as a result of a collision with the surface of the moon,” read a statement from the agency.
As the International Space Station approaches retirement, a transatlantic team is creating a replacement: Starlab.
Airbus and US startup Voyager this week announced a joint venture for the project. The two companies will develop, build, and operate Starlab, which aims to further unite the US and Europe in space.
Europe's trusty Ariane 5 rocket leaves a lasting legacy after its final flight.
The Ariane 5 rocket lifted off for the last time on 6 July from the European Space Agency's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, leaving behind it a stellar track record. Reliability will be one of Ariane 5’s lasting legacies.
“Out of 117 Ariane 5 launches, 112 have been successful”.
Airbus struggles to keep up with its bursting order book.
The European aircraft manufacturer inaugurated a new final assembly line in Toulouse. It will enable the company to produce up to 75 single-aisle aircraft a month.
Airbus is forced to increase production rates substantially for the second consecutive year to meet its targets. It had previously set an ambition of 720 deliveries for 2022, it had only managed to deliver 661 aircraft.
The Webb spacecraft, the most powerful space telescope ever built, was designed and manufactured in Redondo Beach by Northrop Grumman. The corporation is one of the largest aerospace employers in Los Angeles County, with more than 10,000 employees across the region....
Just look at the failed (not literally, but certainly effectively) Manufacturing USA initiative - a constellation of research institutes first launched in 2012 to counter the Made In #China 2025 program.
To its credit, the #Obama Administration foresaw the Chinese economic threat to the West before most in Washington, but the actions taken were structurally ineffective.
Other "tangential failures" like acquiescing #A123 Systems (LFP battery foundational knowledge) and, in the case of the #German government, #Kuka, to #China-state controlled entities advanced the Made In China 2025 program by a decade or more virtually overnight.
Kuka's loss to China also substantially advanced the #Comac#C919 aircraft program - an open secret in many quarters of the Western #aerospace industry that the US and German governments do not want to admit.
In just a few weeks a remarkable European probe will be blasted into space in a bid to explore the dark side of the cosmos.
Scientists hope the Euclid telescope will reveal mysteries of dark matter.
The €1bn mission will investigate the universe’s two most baffling components: dark energy and dark matter. It will capture images that will provide insights about what the universe is made of.
An interesting article here by @mimsical and I would recommend reading it.
I think it is a reasonable take on how, essentially, the regulatory landscape will look in the US and perhaps elsewhere.
That said, I have some notes.
Not so much on the article itself... but on my favorite punching bag, the #NHTSA.
For those that do not know, the NHTSA is the unserious, disinterested and effectively theoretical regulator in the US for vehicle and roadway safety. 🧵
@mimsical Given the rigorous, should-be regulatory process that I itemized in a list above... we would call this an "Airworthiness Certificate" in the commercial #aerospace industry.
Supports my point that regulators are constantly contorting themselves over some kind of compromised, but passable regulatory process for #ADS, when we already have a ready-made, proven one on the table.
Extremely difficult, despite recent missteps, to argue with the safety record of commercial air travel.
This wormy robot can wriggle its way around a jet engine (www.popsci.com)
A new wormy robot could help with jet engine inspections at GE Aerospace, according to an announcement this week. Sensiworm, short for “Soft ElectroNics Skin-Innervated Robotic Worm,” is the newest outgrowth in GE’s line of worm robots, which includes a “giant earthworm” for tunneling and the “Pipeworm” for...
Redondo Beach engineers ‘push the envelope’ with James Webb Space Telescope (www.audacy.com)
The Webb spacecraft, the most powerful space telescope ever built, was designed and manufactured in Redondo Beach by Northrop Grumman. The corporation is one of the largest aerospace employers in Los Angeles County, with more than 10,000 employees across the region....