Free Republic

ITHACA -- A Tompkins County legislator is facing a misdemeanor charge related to an outstanding traffic violation. Martha Robertson, who also is the chairwoman of the legislature's public safety committee, said her arrest last week was the result of a paperwork mix-up and that the Ithaca Police shouldn't have taken her into custody, "They could've issued me a ticket right there," she said, adding that police refused her request to go to her house and see the paperwork. At the station, Sgt. Andy Navarro told her they were waiving her bail based on her community connections, and Patrick Kimmich --...

EDWARDS AFB - The latest research aircraft to join the fleet at Dryden Flight Research Center arrived May 31. The Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, or SOFIA, consists of a 2½-meter (8.2-foot) in diameter infrared telescope mounted inside the 747 airliner, chosen for its ability to house the 45,000-pound telescope. The long-range airliner is capable of remaining airborne for six hours at altitudes higher than 41,000 feet, above much of the atmospheric water vapor. SOFIA will be used to study the universe in the infrared spectrum, as well as to develop observational techniques, instruments and for educational purposes. The aircraft...

NASA has entered into an agreement with the U.S. Air Force to support abort flight test requirements for the Orion Project. The Air Force has contracted with Orbital Sciences Corp. of Chandler, Ariz., to provide launch services for the flight tests. The agreement with the Air Force's Space Development and Test Wing at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M., provides for abort test boosters that will serve as launch vehicles for Orion ascent abort flight tests that are set to occur from 2009 through 2011 at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. The first abort test is scheduled for...

EDWARDS AFB - NASA Dryden Flight Research Center is studying using surplus Navy Phoenix missiles as hypersonic test platforms. The missiles, with the explosives and targeting systems removed, would be launched from the center's F-15 at speeds nearing Mach 2, or twice the speed of sound. The missile, carrying a test article, would then speed to Mach 5, the threshold of hypersonic speeds. The project is intended to provide a new capability to flight test research payloads at hypersonic speeds, Dryden project manager Tom Jones said. It will bridge the gap between wind tunnel and ground model tests and full-scale...

EDWARDS AFB - NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center will once again participate in the Edwards Air Force Base Open House and Air Show, scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 28 and 29, with one of its high-altitude ER-2 Earth science aircraft in the airand several other NASA aircraft on static display. The Lockheed-built ER-2, a civil version of the U-2S military reconnaissance aircraft, is flown by NASA in Earth resources research and satellite sensor validation. Several of NASA Dryden's research and mission support aircraft will also be on display, either along the flight line or in the NASA exhibit area...

Early fighter pilots were sometimes called knights of the air, a reflection of medieval times when knights used blunted lances in jousting tournaments to dismount competitors from their horses. Now, jet-borne jousting is combating supersonic shockwaves, hopefully enough to lessen the resulting sonic boom heard on the ground. Gulfstream Aerospace and NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center have teamed in a project called Quiet Spike to investigate the suppression of sonic booms. The project centers around a retractable, 24-foot-long lance-like spike mounted on the nose of NASA Dryden's F-15B research testbed aircraft. The spike, made primarily of composite materials, creates three...

EDWARDS AFB - NASA engineers are working on a means of training pilots in new methods to successfully fly and land airplanes in emergencies. The project, a joint effort with the Department of Homeland Security and United Airlines, as well as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, is meant to study the effectiveness of using an aircraft's engines to control its flight when the usual flight controls are ineffective. In a technique known as throttles-only control, pilots of an aircraft in which the flight surfaces are inoperable instead use the aircraft engines to direct the airplane. For instance, increasing the...

EDWARDS AFB - Drawing on 60 years of flight test history, NASA Dryden Flight Research Center has been tasked with testing the launch abort system for the space agency's new manned spacecraft designed to return the nation's astronauts to the surface of the moon and beyond. The system, similar in concept to an airplane's ejection system, will be used to remove the manned spacecraft module from the launch vehicle in case of an emergency during launch, either on the pad or once the vehicle is airborne. National Aeronautics and Space Administration officials Monday announced the assignments to each NASA center...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- EDWARDS AFB - NASA Dryden Flight Research Center is preparing to flight test a prototype blended wing body aircraft as part of a joint program with the Air Force Research Laboratory and The Boeing Co. This unusually-shaped aircraft design - described as a cross between a conventional aircraft and a flying wing - is believed to offer greater fuel efficiency by providing more lift and better aerodynamics. The aircraft is shaped as an elongated triangle, with a smooth line from the fuselage extending out into the wings. The Air Force is interested in the technology, should it prove viable,...

Northrop Grumman Corp. will design a supersonic experimental aircraft that employs a wing that varies position for most efficient flight performance under a $10.3 million contract from the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The oblique flying wing program aims to design and conduct the first-ever flight tests of a tailless, supersonic, variable sweep oblique flying wing... In an oblique wing aircraft, one wing of the aircraft is swept forward and the other backward in an asymetrical configuration, which varies with flight speed. The wing, also known as a "scissors wing," pivots over a center point, shifting angle as the...

YUKON, Okla. - NASA engineer and champion aerobatic pilot Marta Bohn-Meyer was killed Sunday when her plane crashed during practice for next week's National Aerobatic Championships. The crash occurred shortly before noon near Oklahoma City, where she was piloting her home-built Giles G-300 airplane. She had been joined there by her husband and fellow aerobatic pilot, Bob Meyer. "Flying and doing things with airplanes is my passion," she once said. "Given a choice, I'll go fly airplanes." According to the International Aerobatic Club, Bohn-Meyer had pulled into a vertical maneuver when the cockpit canopy came off. The airplane then crashed...

EDWARDS AFB - Two-and-a-half years after the last space-shuttle mission ended in catastrophe, NASA again is preparing to send an orbiter and crew of seven astronauts into space. Much of the return-to-flight attention and preparations have been focused on the launch phase, during which Columbia sustained damage that ultimately led to its breaking apart upon reentry. However, improvements have also been made to the other end of the mission - the landing and orbiter processing that follows. Dryden Flight Research Center is also preparing to resume its role as the shuttle's primary alternate landing site, should weather or other contingencies...

MOJAVE - The X-37, an unmanned technology concept demonstrator for future space vehicles, made its first aerial foray Tuesday into the skies over Mojave. Slung beneath Scaled Composites' White Knight carrier, the X-37 was carried to an altitude of 37,800 feet in the 81-minute flight, said Jan Walker, spokesman for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which oversees the program. All systems performed as expected and the captive-carry flight was deemed a success. Additional such captive-carry flights - in which the vehicle remains attached to the White Knight - are expected before three planned drop tests that will test the...

Two teams, one led by Lockheed Martin Corp. and the other by the pairing of Northrop Grumman Corp. and The Boeing Co., will compete to build the nation's next manned spacecraft, NASA announced Tuesday. The agency's requirements for the spacecraft, known as the crew exploration vehicle, or CEV, have yet to be precisely defined, however, as the program itself undergoes a re-evaluation in order to hasten its operational capability. The vehicle is envisioned as the centerpiece of NASA's plans for manned spaceflight, returning to the moon and eventually traveling to Mars and beyond. The two teams were chosen based on...

EDWARDS AFB - Calling Dryden Flight Research Center "a magical place," NASA Administrator Michael Griffin assured a future role for the agency's historic center of flight research. "Dryden is an important center with an important role," he said. "We're not even thinking about not having Dryden. We're not going to let anything bad to happen to it." Forty days into his tenure at the head of the space agency, Griffin visited Dryden on Tuesday, learning of ongoing projects and speaking with center employees. "This is the place where real things happen in the world of flight," Griffin said, noting he...

PALMDALE - Federal judges and aerospace-engineering instructors have replaced the Superior Court judges who used to preside over civil cases at the Palmdale Courthouse. Instead of ruling on family law and civil matters, the federal judges are handing down rulings on disagreements over Social Security benefits. The judicial officers are administrative law judges who hear appeals concerning federal retirement, survivors, disability and supplemental-security income benefits, city spokeswoman Barbara La Fata said. The judges are employed by the Social Security Administration's Office of Hearings and Appeals, La Fata said. Since late November, the judges have been traveling to Palmdale to hear...

EDWARDS AFB - The old saying "birds of a feather flock together" can now be applied to a couple of small uninhabited aerial vehicles, or UAVs, flown at Edwards Air Force Base using principles derived from studies of fish and bird motions. Engineers and technicians from NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, and Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards recently conducted flight tests over a "virtual" forest fire to evaluate new flight-control software that will allow UAVs the ability to autonomously react to obstacles as they fly pre-programmed missions. The tests were conducted via a remote, to investigate cooperative flight...

PALMDALE - NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center, historic home to much of the agency's flight test activities, is looking at smaller budgets now and into the future as NASA directs its focus on space exploration. However, the center at Edwards Air Force Base is positioning itself to play a large part in the agency's remaining aeronautics work as well as take on contracts from outside NASA. In the presidential budget for the 2006 fiscal year unveiled Monday, NASA as a whole was one of the very few federal entities to receive a budget increase next year, up 2.4% to $16.4...

Northrop Grumman Corp. and The Boeing Co. have finalized an agreement to team together to compete for development of NASA's planned Crew Exploration Vehicle. The vehicle is envisioned as the central human space-transportation system within NASA's Project Constellation, a broader organization of human and robotic space systems required for exploration of the Moon and beyond. Specific requirements for the CEV project will not be available until NASA makes its formal request for proposals in March. The agency will award contracts to teams to compete for the project in September, with a "fly-off" planned for 2008, said NASA spokesman Michael Braukus...

EDWARDS AFB - Already holding the world speed record for an air-breathing engine, NASA's X-43A hypersonic research aircraft will aim to top itself with a flight to nearly 10 times the speed of sound next week. The unmanned aircraft's record-setting March flight to Mach 7 - about 5,000 mph - was the first flight test of a supersonic combustion ramjet - or scramjet - engine integrated with an airframe. "We set one (world record) in March, and we're going to do it again next week," said Vince Rauch, Hyper-X program manager at NASA's Langley Flight Research Center in Virginia. The...