Posted on 01/22/2010 9:56:10 AM PST by HuntsvilleTxVeteran
NASA on Wednesday said that it is working on a personal flying suit.
Called Puffin, the conceptual and highly experimental project is part one-man stealth plane, part personal jet pack.
Unveiled at a San Francisco meeting of the American Helicopter Society on Jan. 20 by Mark D. Moore, an aerospace engineer at NASAs Langley Research Center, the Puffin promises on paper at least a self-contained design with proper cockpit and helicopter-style blades that allow for high-altitude flying up to 30,000 ft.
(Excerpt) Read more at smartplanet.com ...
I think someone somewhere said that this guy had “titanium cojones in a kevlar sack.” Yep - I’d say so. This guy is heroic in a way that is truly inspirational.
Here's video of that guy flying across the Channel.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMjuzy68hw0
I understand his day job is flying 747s.
I don’t see the mechanism that causes it to transition from vertical take off to level flight. In the animated cartoon, it just leaned forward somehow.
Maybe it’s intended to be dropped from 30,000 ft and auto-giro its way down.
Otherwise, no way.
In the cyberpunk novel "Neuromance" there is a reference to "Operation Screaming Fist" led by Colonel Willis Corto. The mission was to knock out the Soviet radar installation at Kirensk by dropping Green Berets who would fly in on ultralights and then hack into the computer network.
That didn't work out either. But sounds marginally more practical.
First laugh I have had in days, thanks!
Then, there is Howe and Howe, twin brothers who came up with the most advanced tracked unmanned vehicle in the world..working on their own dime developing their concept.
Appropriately named “Ripsaw”
http://www.howeandhowetechnologies.com/
Check out the videos. Ripsaw is something else.
My point being both of these are private innovations that were built without government funding.
Hey, I read that book. Many years after it came out, and long after it was a "cool" book to read.
If you can’t mount Hellfire missles or a Minigun on it, I’m not interested.
Thanks for correcting my spelling! I saw that I had dropped the “r” but was too lazy to post a correction.
That landing feet first looks pretty darn tricky.
I don’t like it.. I get claustrophobic just looking at it.
Luzz Bitequeer.
I assume they have a built in relief tube, but what if you’ve got an itch?
I WANT ONE!
Arrogantly twisting the sterile canvas snoot of a fully charged icing
Anointment utensil he poots forths a quarter-ounce green rosette (oh ah yuk
Yuk... lets try that again...!) he poots forth a quarter-ounce green rosette
Near the summit of a dense but radiant muffin of his own design.
Later he says:
Some people... some people like cupcakes exclusively, while myself, I say
There is naught nor ought there be nothing so exalted on the face of gods grey
Earth as that prince of foods... the muffin!
Girl you thought he was a man
But he was a muffin
He hung around till you found
That he didn’t know nuthin
Girl you thought he was a man
But he only was a-puffin
No cries is heard in the night
As a result of him stuffin
Muffin Man - Frank Zappa
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