Star Energy Share Discussion Threads

[scuba doo] 26/7/2007 17:04

It has to be said, Brian was in bl00dy good form that day (we got on like a bl00dy house on fire)

I'd go into more detail, but you know me - I'm not one to names drop .

[scuba doo] 26/7/2007 17:02

I'm the one in the grey whistle looking over Bab's shoulder .

[mad3it] 26/7/2007 16:58

Cant see you Scube, unless you've changed colour and changed your name to Rudolph.

[scuba doo] 26/7/2007 16:53

Suffice to say my picture's in there also -




Well, it's the very least my readers have come to expect .

[scuba doo] 25/7/2007 19:16

Who, SF is back ?

Did you meet him before he went away or since he got back ?

[hammy_davies_snr] 25/7/2007 18:02

No wurries mate

I met him once 'n all.

Wac.

[scuba doo] 25/7/2007 17:04

Thanks , Hammy .

[hammy_davies_snr] 25/7/2007 17:03

SF is back - 25 Jul'07 - 14:58 - 3595 of 3656




Met Jonathon Ross once though. Nice guy...

SF

[scuba doo] 22/7/2007 11:58

Just in case anyone was wondering why I wasn't posting yesterday - it was Shane's wedding day.

Small affair, just family and close friends.


I hope he liked the knife set (complete with hardwood block)



Scuba.

[kozel] 27/6/2007 17:11

You're such a name dropper scube. Shane really, bacause apart from that you seem like a perfectly well-balanced human being. I won't ask how old you are.

[scuba doo] 27/6/2007 17:03

Well, it's funny you should prompt me. I had Shane on the old blower last night.

He rang to wish me happy birthday, which is more than could be said for any of my readers/followers.

Say what you like about Shane, but he's never forgotten his root hasn't that one (A bit like me I guess - probably why we get on so well)

[kozel] 27/6/2007 16:22

Another day of quality posts on the star thread I see. I don't know how you keep up with them all scube, I really don't.

[kozel] 26/6/2007 15:40

It's not the quantity that counts ...

[waldron] 14/6/2007 08:49

Last Updated: Wednesday, 13 June 2007, 17:06 GMT 18:06 UK

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Firm rockets into space tourism

The whole flight would last one-and-a-half hours


In pictures

The European aerospace giant EADS is going into the space tourism business.
Its Astrium division says it will build a space plane capable of carrying fare-paying passengers on a sub-orbital ride more than 100km above the planet.

The vehicle, which will take off from a normal airport, will give the tourists a three-to-five-minute experience of weightlessness at the top of its climb.

Tickets are expected to cost up to 200,000 euros (£135,000), with flights likely to begin in 2012.

There must be millions of people who have dreamt about this since they were little kids

Marc Newson, designer
"We believe it is the will of human beings to visit space and we have to give them the possibility to do that," said Francois Auque, the CEO of Astrium.

"Astrium is by far the largest space company in Europe, so we are very knowledgeable in all these matters. We believe our concept is extremely safe, extremely comfortable and cost effective," he told BBC News.

Two in one

EADS Astrium is the company that builds the Ariane rocket, which lofts most of the world's commercial satellites. Its space jet is a very different concept, however.


The passengers would get a few minutes of weightlessness
The front end of a full-scale model was unveiled at a publicity event in Paris on Wednesday. From a certain angle, the vehicle resembles an ordinary executive aircraft - but its engineers claim it is in fact "revolutionary".

The production model will use normal jet engines to take off and climb to 12km. From there, a rocket engine will kick the vehicle straight up, taking it beyond 60km in just 80 seconds. By the time the rocket shuts down, the craft should have sufficient velocity to carry it above 100km - into space.

As the plane then begins to fall back to Earth, the pilot will use small thrusters to control its attitude, guiding the vehicle into the atmosphere from where it will use its jet engines again to return to the airport.

The total journey time will be about one-and-a-half hours.

World window

Astrium says there will be room for four passengers on each mission. Towards the top of the climb, these individuals will be able to float free in the cabin and look through large windows at the planet below.

Astrium is proposing a different technical solution to the one being pursued by airline boss Sir Richard Branson and his Virgin Galactic enterprise.


SpaceShipOne was slung beneath a carrier aircraft
Branson's operation - timed to start about 2009 - is basing its vehicles on the record-breaking SpaceShipOne rocket plane which became the first privately built craft to reach space in 2004.

SpaceShipOne had to be carried to a launch altitude by another vehicle before using rocket propulsion; and on its return from space, glided to its home runway. Astrium says it decision to go with a one-stage concept was driven by safety and economic considerations.

The Australian Marc Newson was employed to design the space plane's interior. He said he had put great emphasis on the seats - which he describes as "hi-tech hammocks" - and the windows to maximise the flight experience.

Child's dream

"The windows are very similar to a civilian jet airliner but they're about 30% bigger; but more importantly, there're 15 windows and only four passengers, so there're are plenty of opportunities to float around the interior of this cabin and take different views of space, the stars, the Moon, and the Earth," Mr Newson explained.

"It will be amazing. You'll actually be outside the Earth's atmosphere; you'll be able to see Earth as a spherical object and everything else around you will be black. There must be millions of people who have dreamt about this since they were little kids," he told the BBC.

EADS Astrium says its space jet project is likely to cost a billion euros to develop. It will be looking for financial and industrial partners over the next year. It says that if development work starts in 2008, the first commercial flights could be made in 2012.

"The development of a new vehicle able to operate in altitudes between aircraft (20km) and below satellites (200km) could well be a precursor for rapid transport, point-to-point vehicles, or quick access to space," Astrium said in a statement.

"Its development will contribute to maintaining and even enhancing European competencies in core technologies for space transportation."

[waldron] 13/6/2007 18:24

Eads(Euro Aeronautic EADS' Astrium aims to launch space tourism flights by 2012-13


PARIS (Thomson Financial) - EADS unit Astrium said it plans to launch a
space tourism programme next year with a view to starting 90-minute, sub-orbital
flights from 2012-2013.
The price of the flight will be "around 150,000-200,000 euros", Astrium
president Francois Auque told journalists, compared with "25 million dollars"
for the handful of space tourists to have flown with Russia's Soyuz rocket.
The Astrium sub-orbital flight will offer tourists three minutes of
weightlessness at an altitude of 100 km.
The market for space tourist flights could reach 15,000 passengers per year
by around 2020, Francois Auque said.
Richard Branson is already developing a similar project, Virgin Galactic,
with plans to start flights in 2009.




[e-mail]
afp/gt/gp

[waldron] 26/4/2007 12:43

Alcatel-Lucent EU'S Verheugen says axing Galileo project is 'out of the question' UPDATE


(Adds comments on upcoming EU proposal)
BRUSSELS (Thomson Financial) - EU enterprise and industry commissioner
Guenter Verheugen said any notion of giving up on Europe's Galileo satellite
navigation system project is "out of the question".
Unveiling proposals for an EU space policy, Verheugen said that for all its
problems the project is "absolutely essential" for Europe.
"We don't have an option of giving up on Galileo. That's out of the
question," he said at a news conference.
The European Commission has given eight companies working on Galileo until
May 10 to make progress on the project, which is meant to be fully operational
by 2012.
The companies include EADS, Alcatel-Lucent, Thales, Inmarsat and
Finmeccanica SpA.
Verheugen said the commission is looking at how the project should be
funded.
"The commission is working intensively looking at the future use of Galileo
and the viability of ideas up to now," he said.
He said transport commissioner Jacques Barrot will make a proposal to the
commission on May 10.
The commission's aim is to ensure "there are no further delays for Galileo
and that the services are offered in the way planned and that we ensure
long-term funding for the project".

[e-mail]
vm/hjp//cmr

[waldron] 04/4/2007 16:37

Eads(Euro Aeronautic Europe's Arianespace wins order to launch fifth Optus satellite in 2009


PARIS (AFX) - Pan-European group Arianespace said it has won an order to
launch a telecommunications satellite in 2009 for Australian company Optus, a
unit of Singapore's Singtel.
The financial terms of the contract were not disclosed.
The Optus D3 will be the fifth Optus satellite to be launched by Arianespace
and will be built by Orbital Sciences in the US, Arianespace said in a press
release.
The contract brings to 41 the number of outstanding satellite-launch orders
on Arianespace's books.
The group's various shareholders include EADS, which has a 30 pct stake
according to the Arianespace website.
[e-mail]
afp/gt/amb

[waldron] 30/3/2007 19:48

NASA worries about gap in space flight


CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Sometime in 2010, the world's leading
space-exploring nation will say goodbye to manned space flight for more than
four years.
And that has U.S. policymakers worried.
The flight gap will occur because NASA is winding down its space shuttle
program near the end of 2010 to move into the next phase of space exploration --
the moon and Mars. The next-generation spacecraft, the Orion capsule, won't be
ready for manned flight until March 2015.
During those gap years, the United States must rely on the good will of
other nations if it wants to send astronauts and cargo to the international
space station.
"Who knows what the geopolitics is going to be like in 2015?" asks U.S. Sen.
Bill Nelson, the Florida Democrat who chairs the Space, Aeronautics and Related
Sciences subcommittee. "Is Russia still going to be allied with us? Would they
possibly be allied with China at that point?"
The space agency has been in this position before. There was a six-year gap
between the last Apollo flight in 1975 and the first shuttle flight in 1981.
In the meantime, NASA will have to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to
Russia for a lift to the space station, although private companies also may be
hired for trips to low-Earth orbit.
"It is not a very desirable situation," said John Logsdon, director of the
Space Policy Institute at George Washington University. "We will have an
orbiting destination that we have spent multiple billions of dollars of U.S.
taxpayer money to develop. To not be able to get there except for the good will
of others is a little ironic."
NASA fears the United States will risk losing its title as the leading
spacefaring nation as Russia, Europe, Japan, China and India improve their
ability to send humans and cargo into space during the gap years. Currently, the
only three nations with vehicles able to fly people to space are China, Russia
and the United States.
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin recently told lawmakers that China's
ambitious space program could feasibly beat the United States in the race back
to the moon, although he and outside experts say there's no indication yet that
China is on that path.
The gap also could contribute to a loss of interest in space exploration by
the U.S. public and Congress, and that could diminish the resources allotted to
the space agency, said W. Henry Lambright, a political science professor at
Syracuse University.
"It's really important for NASA to have activity, to keep going, to
constantly have a face in Washington based on its successes," Lambright said.
Griffin recently called the gap "unseemly," but he has few options with the
budgets NASA has been given by the White House and Congress since President Bush
first announced plans to return to the moon three years ago. NASA has put the
cost of returning to the moon at $104 billion, although the General Accounting
Office puts it at $122 billion through 2018.
"Space is not only not a high priority, it's hard to keep it on the radar
screen for the White House right now," Lambright said.
NASA had hoped to have the first manned Orion flight as early as 2012. That
would be a low-orbit test flight. But that goal was pushed back to 2014 when
NASA had to raid the Orion development fund to fill in a $3 billion shortfall
for finishing space station construction and ending the shuttle program. Repairs
to NASA buildings damaged by Hurricane Katrina also siphoned off money.
Space agency officials said the 2007 budget would remove more than $500
million from what NASA had budgeted for developing the new spacecraft, pushing
the first manned flight of Orion into March 2015. A moon landing is scheduled
for no later than 2020.
U.S. Sens. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, this
month proposed increasing NASA's funding by $1 billion. Mikulski also called for
a space summit between Congress and the White House to raise the profile of
NASA's budget needs.
Nelson said the gap could be narrowed to three years if NASA were to get an
extra $400 million above the 2008 budget request and an extra $800 million each
in 2009 and 2010. NASA's budget request for 2008 is $17.3 billion.
During the last gap in space flight, which ended in 1981, the agency had a
brain drain in which experienced engineers and technicians left for other
opportunities and "essentially, the manned space program went off the radar
screen," Lambright said.
"When you don't fly for four or more years, people become stale," Griffin
said recently. "Very good people often move into other enterprises where there
is more action. Facilities degrade. It's not a good thing."

[waldron] 26/3/2007 15:34

Launch of European-made station cargo freighter slips
BY STEPHEN CLARK
SPACEFLIGHT NOW
Posted: March 25, 2007

A European craft designed to ferry science experiments, fuel and other supplies to the international space station will launch this fall, several months later than originally planned, officials said last week.


An artist's impression shows the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) during docking with the space station. Credit: ESA - D.Ducros


The European Space Agency's first Automated Transfer Vehicle, named Jules Verne after the famous science fiction author, will have to wait until at least September before it is launched to the space station. Further delays could push the mission back to November, ESA said in a statement Thursday.

The ATV was previously scheduled for launch this summer.

The postponement is due to several factors, including a problem with the Russian Global Positioning System, issues developing test procedures last year, and the compatibility of this year's space station manifest, ESA astronaut Jean-Francois Clervoy, a senior advisor to the $1.3 billion ATV program, told Spaceflight Now.

"The exact impact of the latter remains to be evaluated," Clervoy said in an interview.

The uncertainty stems from last month's hail storm in Florida, which damaged foam on the external fuel tank attached to space shuttle Atlantis. The dented foam forced NASA managers to opt to roll the shuttle back from the launch pad for repairs.

The storm has pushed back Atlantis's upcoming station construction mission until at least May. Further delays of subsequent missions by a few weeks are also expected.

The shuttle delays will force the station's international partners to overhaul the schedule for visiting spacecraft, including Russia's Progress cargo vehicle. The Progress often occupies the Russian Zvezda service module's aft docking port, where the ATV must dock during its mission.

Depending on how the space shuttle and Progress manifests are reshuffled, the flight of Jules Verne could be booted to November. International discussions are underway between space agency leaders in Europe, Russia and the United States, according to Clervoy.

"(The) two launch windows are compatible with the vehicle and control center readiness, but the final choice will take into account the availability of the aft docking port of the Russian segment and the resolution of potential conflicts with other space vehicle traffic," he said.

Another factor in the delay involved a critical test at a simulator facility outside Moscow to check the interface between the Russian segment of the station and the ATV that faced challenges from problems with the Russian Global Positioning System, which is required for the craft to successfully rendezvous and dock with the orbiting outpost.

Engineers had to create a software upgrade to fix the GPS problem, and the test proceeded as planned to verify the spacecraft's Russian-built rendezvous system and docking mechanism. Other software tests in Russia validated the ATV propulsion system, which will transfer spare propellant to the space station, in addition to conducting attitude control activities and reboosts.

Software development issues have resulted in delays for the ATV in the past. Flight software tests had to be pushed back due to difficulties with the ground test bed facility designed to check the software, Clervoy said.

But the ATV's flight software is now ready for its big debut later this year.

"Both the main software and backup safety software have completed software dedicated testing and are now in (a) regular maintenance status, meaning that they are mature and used for functional testing," Clervoy said.

Hardware tests using a ground replica of Russia's Zvezda module are planned for later this spring to make sure the ATV can successfully feed maneuvering propellant into Zvezda's fuel tanks. The ATV is designed to refuel the station with up to 1,900 pounds of propellant, according to ESA.

Officials are also running extensive mission simulations including the ATV control center in Toulouse, France, and space station mission control centers in Houston and Moscow.

Expedition 16 crew members Peggy Whitson and Yuri Malenchenko are also undergoing training for ATV docking operations. The crew will monitor the automatic rendezvous sequence and can issue an abort command if necessary.

While software engineers and flight controllers have been continuing mission simulations, the first ATV spacecraft has been sitting in a clean room at ESA's technical center in the Netherlands, Clervoy said.

The flight model of the ATV underwent two key environmental tests last year. An acoustic test to simulate the violent sound and vibrations of launch was successfully completed last July. In December, engineers finished the thermal vacuum test, which exposed Jules Verne to the extreme temperatures and vacuum of space.

Clervoy said the thermal vacuum test was postponed from last summer due to problems developing the test procedures for flight hardware.

The resupply ship should be transported to its launch site in Kourou, French Guiana, later this spring, Clervoy said.

The ATV's cargo and resource modules were recently disassembled for the two-week trek to South America. The craft and its nearly one million pounds of support equipment will be shipped to Kourou by sea.

Once it arrives at the launch site, technicians will spend nearly four months readying the craft for its maiden launch. Work in Kourou will include the loading of the ATV's cargo and fuel.

After launch aboard an Ariane 5 rocket, the 45,000-pound craft will unfurl its four solar panels spanning 73 feet to produce electricity as it begins its journey to each the station. Once the 32-foot-long spacecraft is docked, the space station crew will open hatches between Jules Verne and Zvezda to begin offloading supplies. The craft will likely remain attached to the station for up to six months, according to ESA.

The ATV can carry almost 17,000 pounds of supplies to the space station, including scientific payload racks for the station's science laboratories, food, clothing, and water. Pressurized tanks aboard the ATV can also hold oxygen, nitrogen and propellant to be transferred to the station.

About 14,000 pounds of trash and other unnecessary materials can be stored on the ATV until it is undocked. The spacecraft is designed to burn up during a guided reentry into Earth's atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, providing an economical way to get rid of discarded supplies.

The ATV's cargo capacity to the space station is more than three times that of the venerable Russian Progress resupply vessel. The European craft can also hold almost four times more trash than the Progress for the trip back into the atmosphere.

At least five ATV's are officially planned by ESA, and parts for the second flight vehicle are built and awaiting assembly, Clervoy said.

Clervoy said most of those components come from spares constructed for Jules Verne.

ESA hopes to launch about one ATV mission per year in the future. Cargo delivery duties will be shared between NASA's space shuttle fleet, the Russian Progress capsule, the ATV, and Japan's H-2 Transfer Vehicle, which is projected to fly in late 2008.

[ariane] 24/3/2007 07:43

Rocketman takes to the skies

A Swiss pilot has turned himself into a 'rocketman' by strapping a pair of wings and two jet engines to his back.



Yves Rossy, 45, a former airforce fighter pilot, gave his carbon wings their first test flight in Spain.

He said: "It is absolutely fantastic. Total freedom in three dimensions, so much speed and power, it was better than being a bird.



"I have to jump from a moving plane as I can't really take off from an airfield like a real plane, I couldn't run that fast", he said laughing, and added: "I don't have an undercarriage either."

To land he has to cut the engines and coast to the ground, using a conventional parachute at the last minute.

Mr Rossy spent five years developing his three metre carbon fibre wings for his flying man project, then added two kerosene-powered jet engines to his original wing design.

Handles are fixed onto the wings so that Yves can electronically manipulate the wingtips, giving him the freedom to decide when he wanted to either glide or dive.

He said: "After I jumped my wings opened like a bird taking wing, I then glided down to 2500m, and ignited the kerosene engines.

"There was a short period, 30 seconds, while I waited for them to stabilize and then I began to open the throttle.

"I soon realised I was no longer losing height, and achieved horizontal flight for more than four minutes at 100 knots (115mph)."

[ariane] 23/3/2007 08:27

Eads(Euro Aeronautic Galileo partners to form joint company within days - report


BRUSSELS (AFX) - The eight partners in the Galileo satellite navigation
system project will form a joint company within days, the Financial Times
reported, citing an EU diplomat.
The companies -- including EADS, Alcatel-Lucent, Thales, Inmarsat and
Finmeccanica SpA -- have agreed to establish a joint venture to develop the
global positioning system, the daily said.
Yesterday, EU transport ministers warned the consortium that they will seek
alternatives for completing the project unless it resolves key organisation,
technical and financial problems.
"To date there have been considerable delays," said German transport
minister Wolfgang Tiefensee, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency.
Unless the companies demonstrate progress by May 10, Tiefensee said, "we
(will) need to look to new ways of moving this major innovation project forward
and getting it back on track".
[e-mail]
afp/fr/amb/vm/jlw

[waldron] 22/3/2007 17:14

Eads(Euro Aeronautic EU says Galileo consortium must solve problems by May or will seek alternative


BRUSSELS (AFX) - EU transport ministers said they will seek alternatives for
completing Galileo, the European satellite navigation system, unless the current
consortium resolves key organisation, technical and financial problems.
"To date there have been considerable delays," said German Transport
Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee, who was chairing a meeting with counterparts in
Brussels.
Unless the companies demonstrate progress in resolving the problems by May
10, Tiefensee said, "we (will) need to look to new ways of moving this major
innovation project forward and getting it back on track."
"If the consortium were not to respond we would look at all possibilities,
including a new call for tender, but we're not at that stage and I feel that
this ultimatum will be respected," said EU Transport Commissioner Jacques
Barrot.
The eight companies which won the contract for the project in June 2005 --
including EADS, Alcatel-Lucent, Thales, Inmarsat and Finmeccanica SpA -- have
failed to create a single company or name a CEO to take the project forward.
The system is worth around 1.5 billion eur (1.95 bln usd) and is meant to be
fully operational by 2012.
Barrot said the consortium had until May 10 to come up with a single
operating structure, with one head capable of speaking for all the members.
"We need a consortium company that is capable of negotiating and taking
decisions, so that the blockades are not continued," said Tiefensee. "That is
why Galileo is still in a crisis."
[e-mail]
afp/fr/amb

[grupo guitarlumber] 21/3/2007 05:14

SpaceX launches new rocket


LOS ANGELES (AP) - A new commercial rocket reached space after launching
from a Pacific atoll Tuesday but then probably re-entered the Earth's atmosphere
after half an orbit because of a problem during the second-stage burn, an
entrepreneur said.
Nonetheless, Elon Musk, founder of Space Exploration Technologies,
characterized the launch as "a pretty good test" during a post-flight
teleconference.
"We successfully reached space and really retired almost all the risk
associated with the rocket, so I feel very good about where things are," he
said.
No anomalies were recorded until late in the second-stage burn, when a
roll-control problem prematurely shut down the stage after the rocket reached an
altitude of 186 miles, he said.
"We feel that's something pretty straightforward to address," he said from
El Segundo, Calif., where the company known as SpaceX is based.
The launch was broadcast on the Internet from Omelek island in the
Kwajawlein atoll. The view from a camera aboard the rocket showed the island
quickly recede, then after a few minutes the Earth's sphere became apparent
before the transmission was lost.
SpaceX had not successfully launched a Falcon 1, a 70-foot-long, two-stage
rocket powered by liquid oxygen and kerosene. It is designed to carry up to
1,254 pounds into low orbit for $6.7 million.
A launch nearly a year ago failed when leaking fuel caught fire seconds into
liftoff. Tuesday's mission, dubbed Demo-2, was designed primarily to gather
flight data.
The launch shortly after 9 p.m. EDT followed two failed attempts, one on
Monday and one just over an hour before the launch.
Tuesday's abort was caused by low pressure in the combustion chamber, launch
commentator Gwynn Shotwell in Washington, D.C., said.
An attempt to launch on Monday was aborted when a split-second delay in
communications with the vehicle was detected.
Musk was a co-founder of the PayPal Inc. electronic payment system now owned
by eBay.