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This week in 2001, space shuttle Endeavour, mission STS-100, landed after a successful 11-day mission to the International Space Station. Endeavour delivered the new Remote Manipulator System, or Canadarm2, to the station. Here, astronauts Scott Parazynski and Chris Hadfield prepare to unpack Canadarm2 during the first of two spacewalks. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1990, space shuttle Columbia, mission STS-35, launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center carrying Astronomy Laboratory 1 in its cargo bay. ASTRO-1 was developed as a system of telescopes that could fly multiple times on the space shuttle. It consisted of three ultraviolet telescopes and an X-ray telescope. The telescopes were mounted on a Spacelab pallet in the payload bay of the shuttle. NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center was responsible for managing the Spacelab missions. Here, the various components of the ASTRO-1 payload are seen above the backdrop of Earth. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1966, AS-201, the first Saturn IB rocket, lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. Designed and developed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, the AS-201 mission was an uncrewed suborbital flight to test the Saturn IB and the Apollo Command and Service modules. The objectives of the flight were to verify the structural integrity, launch loads, stage separation and operation of subsystems of the Saturn 1B, and evaluate the Apollo spacecraft subsystems, heatshield and mission support facilities. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope was deployed from the cargo bay of space shuttle Discovery as part of STS-31. NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center was responsible for the design, development, and construction of the Hubble Space Telescope and has played a significant role in the testing of Hubble's successor, the James Webb Space Telescope. Scheduled to launch in October 2018, the Webb telescope will observe the most distant objects in the universe, provide images of the first galaxies formed and see unexplored planets around distant stars. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological, and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
For more fun throwbacks, check out Marshall's History Album by clicking here.
This week in 1968, Apollo 8 lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The primary mission objectives included a coordinated performance of the crew, the command and service module and the support facilities. The mission also demonstrated trans-lunar injection -- a propulsive maneuver used to set a spacecraft on a trajectory that will cause it to arrive at the Moon. All primary mission objectives were met and detailed test objectives were achieved. The crew escaped Earth’s gravity, traveled to the lunar vicinity, and orbited the Moon before returning to Earth on Dec. 27. Apollo 8 was the first crewed flight of the Saturn V vehicle and the first crewed lunar orbit mission. Now through December 2022, NASA will mark the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program that landed a dozen astronauts on the Moon between July 1969 and December 1972, and the first U.S. crewed mission -- Apollo 8 -- that circumnavigated the Moon in December 1968. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
The Old Street modernization program's relentless tide of impersonal concrete, steel and glass continues to bulldoze the area; as if architectural history has no value. It's a ubiquitous trend across large UK urban centers and appears to be running in parallel with an inexorable erasure of traditional British culture.
I ditched the Adobe Photography plan with Lightroom and Photoshop last January. I have been using Capture One for my digital asset management {DAM} and photo processing and am very happy I made the switch. I purchased Affinity Photo 2 days ago and I am trying to adjust to the editing techniques and using the many online tutorials for learning the tools. This is a GREAT replacement for photoshop! No monthly or annual renewal subscription fees and the program's cost is under $50.
All the birds in the above image are taken from my backyard this spring. I selectively inserted them into a layer masked logo I created using Affinity Photo.
I am Aiansueto Kita Chojin! I come from-
Wait, what?
Non-sweat pita bread?
What did he say??
-the deadli... My name is Aiansueto Kita Chojin! I have-
Iron sweater what?
What does it say in the program?
...programs rustling...
-destr... LISTEN! I have told you my name is Aiansueto Kita Chojin! From this-
Ian Sweetman?
I don't think its 'Sweetman'.
moment I-
The program says, "Tonight on Tuesday Night Fights, meet a deadly new Chojin from the North!"
No name?
Was that exclamation yours or the program's?
The program's.
I HAVE TOLD YOU MY NAME!!!
Yeah... that didn't really help.
💪M💪U💪S💪C💪L💪E💪
A year of the shows and performers of the Bijou Planks Theater.
M.U.S.C.L.E.
# 106
"Aiansueto Kita Chojin"
Painted by Paprika, thus losing all collectible value forever.
my first attempt at stacking (using Zerene) - I am impressed with the program's ability to merge the 10 photos together, given that they were taken handheld with a strong breeze and poor light. I think this could be the way forward for my macro attempts...
This week in 1999, space shuttle Columbia, mission STS-93, launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on a four-day mission to deliver the Chandra X-ray Observatory to low-Earth orbit. Chandra was then be propelled to an orbit of 44,759 miles in altitude using a two-stage Inertial Upper Stage. This was the first mission in shuttle history to be commanded by a woman, astronaut Eileen Collins. Here, Chandra's High Resolution Camera is integrated with the High Resolution Mirror Assembly in the 24-foot vacuum chamber at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center's X-ray and Cryogenic Facility. Marshall manages the Chandra program. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA's remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological, and scientific aspects of NASA's activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA's history, visit the Marshall History Program's webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1990, space shuttle Discovery, mission STS-31, launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on a five-day mission to deploy the Hubble Space Telescope. Here, Hubble clears the orbiter’s cargo bay during its deployment on April 25, 1990. NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center was responsible for the overall design, development and construction of the observatory. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
Nikkormat FTn w/Vivitar 85-205mm f 3.8 Zoom w/2x teleconverter.
Apollo 17Pad 39A
Apollo 17 (December 7–19, 1972) was the eleventh and final mission of NASA's Apollo program, the sixth and most recent time humans have set foot on the Moon or traveled beyond low Earth orbit. Commander Gene Cernan and Lunar Module Pilot Harrison Schmitt walked on the Moon, while Command Module Pilot Ronald Evans orbited above. Schmitt was the only professional geologist to land on the Moon; he was selected in place of Joe Engle, as NASA had been under pressure to send a scientist to the Moon. The mission's heavy emphasis on science meant the inclusion of a number of new experiments, including a biological experiment containing five mice that was carried in the command module.
Mission planners had two primary goals in deciding on the landing site: to sample lunar highland material older than that at Mare Imbrium and to investigate the possibility of relatively recent volcanic activity. They therefore selected Taurus–Littrow, where formations that had been viewed and pictured from orbit were thought to be volcanic in nature. Since all three crew members had backed up previous Apollo lunar missions, they were familiar with the Apollo spacecraft and had more time for geology training.
Launched at 12:33 a.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST) on December 7, 1972, following the only launch-pad delay in the course of the whole Apollo program that was caused by a hardware problem, Apollo 17 was a "J-type" mission that included three days on the lunar surface, expanded scientific capability, and the use of the third Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). Cernan and Schmitt landed in the Taurus–Littrow valley, completed three moonwalks, took lunar samples and deployed scientific instruments. Orange soil was discovered at Shorty crater; it proved to be volcanic in origin, although from early in the Moon's history. Evans remained in lunar orbit in the command and service module (CSM), taking scientific measurements and photographs. The spacecraft returned to Earth on December 19.
The mission broke several records for crewed spaceflight, including the longest crewed lunar landing mission (12 days, 14 hours),[7] greatest distance from a spacecraft during an extravehicular activity of any type (7.6 kilometers or 4.7 miles), longest time on the lunar surface (75 hours), longest total duration of lunar-surface extravehicular activities (22 hours, 4 minutes),[8] largest lunar-sample return (approximately 115 kg or 254 lb), longest time in lunar orbit (6 days, 4 hours),[7] and greatest number of lunar orbits (75).[9]
Crew and key Mission Control personnel
Position[10] Astronaut
Commander Eugene A. Cernan
Third and last spaceflight
Command Module Pilot (CMP) Ronald E. Evans
Only spaceflight
Lunar Module Pilot (LMP) Harrison H. Schmitt
Only spaceflight
In 1969, NASA announced[11] that the backup crew of Apollo 14 would be Gene Cernan, Ronald Evans, and former X-15 pilot Joe Engle.[12][13] This put them in line to be the prime crew of Apollo 17, because the Apollo program's crew rotation generally meant that a backup crew would fly as prime crew three missions later. Harrison Schmitt, who was a professional geologist as well as an astronaut, had served on the backup crew of Apollo 15, and thus, because of the rotation, would have been due to fly as lunar module pilot on Apollo 18.[14]
In September 1970, the plan to launch Apollo 18 was cancelled. The scientific community pressed NASA to assign a geologist, rather than a pilot with non-professional geological training, to an Apollo landing. NASA subsequently assigned Schmitt to Apollo 17 as the lunar module pilot. After that, NASA's director of flight crew operations, Deke Slayton, was left with the question of who would fill the two other Apollo 17 slots: the rest of the Apollo 15 backup crew (Dick Gordon and Vance Brand), or Cernan and Evans from the Apollo 14 backup crew. Slayton ultimately chose Cernan and Evans.[11] Support at NASA for assigning Cernan was not unanimous. Cernan had crashed a Bell 47G helicopter into the Indian River near Cape Kennedy during a training exercise in January 1971; the accident was later attributed to pilot error, as Cernan had misjudged his altitude before crashing into the water. Jim McDivitt, who was manager of the Apollo Spacecraft Program Office at the time, objected to Cernan's selection because of this accident, but Slayton dismissed the concern. After Cernan was offered command of the mission, he advocated for Engle to fly with him on the mission, but it was made clear to him that Schmitt would be assigned instead, with or without Cernan, so he acquiesced.[15][16] The prime crew of Apollo 17 was publicly announced on August 13, 1971.[17]
When assigned to Apollo 17, Cernan was a 38-year-old captain in the United States Navy; he had been selected in the third group of astronauts in 1963, and flown as pilot of Gemini 9A in 1966 and as lunar module pilot of Apollo 10 in 1969 before he served on Apollo 14's backup crew. Evans, 39 years old when assigned to Apollo 17, had been selected as part of the fifth group of astronauts in 1966, and had been a lieutenant commander in the United States Navy. Schmitt, a civilian, was 37 years old when assigned Apollo 17, had a doctorate in geology from Harvard University, and had been selected in the fourth group of astronauts in 1965. Both Evans and Schmitt were making their first spaceflights.[18]
For the backup crews of Apollo 16 and 17, the final Apollo lunar missions, NASA selected astronauts who had already flown Apollo lunar missions, to take advantage of their experience, and avoid investing time and money in training rookies who would be unlikely to ever fly an Apollo mission.[19][20] The original backup crew for Apollo 17, announced at the same time as the prime crew,[17] was the crew of Apollo 15: David Scott as commander, Alfred Worden as CMP and James Irwin as LMP, but in May 1972 they were removed from the backup crew because of their roles in the Apollo 15 postal covers incident.[21] They were replaced with the landing crew of Apollo 16: John W. Young as backup crew commander, Charles Duke as LMP, and Apollo 14's CMP, Stuart Roosa.[18][22][23] Originally, Apollo 16's CMP, Ken Mattingly, was to be assigned along with his crewmates, but he declined so he could spend more time with his family, his son having just been born, and instead took an assignment to the Space Shuttle program.[24] Roosa had also served as backup CMP for Apollo 16.[25]
For the Apollo program, in addition to the prime and backup crews that had been used in the Mercury and Gemini programs, NASA assigned a third crew of astronauts, known as the support crew. Their role was to provide any assistance in preparing for the missions that the missions director assigned then. Preparations took place in meetings at facilities across the US and sometimes needed a member of the flight crew to attend them. Because McDivitt was concerned that problems could be created if a prime or backup crew member was unable to attend a meeting, Slayton created the support crews to ensure that someone would be able to attend in their stead.[26] Usually low in seniority, they also assembled the mission's rules, flight plan and checklists, and kept them updated;[27][28] for Apollo 17, they were Robert F. Overmyer, Robert A. Parker and C. Gordon Fullerton.[29]
Flight directors were Gerry Griffin, first shift, Gene Kranz and Neil B. Hutchinson, second shift, and Pete Frank and Charles R. Lewis, third shift.[30] According to Kranz, flight directors during the program Apollo had a one-sentence job description, "The flight director may take any actions necessary for crew safety and mission success."[31] Capsule communicators (CAPCOMs) were Fullerton, Parker, Young, Duke, Mattingly, Roosa, Alan Shepard and Joseph P. Allen.[32]
Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_17
NEW JERSEY 2017 BALD EAGLE PROJECT REPORT
ANOTHER PRODUCTIVE YEAR FOR NJ’S EAGLES
by Larissa Smith, CWF Wildlife Biologist
The Conserve Wildlife Foundation of NJ in partnership with the NJ Endangered and Nongame Species Program has released the 2017 NJ Bald Eagle Project Report. In 2017, 178 eagle nests were monitored during the nesting season. Of these nests 153 were active (with eggs) and 25 were territorial or housekeeping pairs. One hundred and ninety young were fledged.
In 2017 the number of active nests was three more than in 2016, but the number young fledged decreased by 27 from a record high of 216 fledged in 2016. The productivity rate this season of 1.25 young/active nest is still above the required range of 0.0 to 1.1 for population maintenance. Productivity could be lower this season for many reasons including weather, predation and disturbance to the nesting area. In 2017 nest monitors reported several instances of “intruder” eagles at nests which did disrupt the nesting attempts of several pairs. One of these “eagle dramas” unfolded at the Duke Farms eagle cam watched by millions of people. An intruder female attempted to replace the current female. This harassment interrupted the pairs bonding and copulation and no eggs were laid.
This year’s report includes a section on Resightings of banded eagles. Resightings of NJ (green) banded eagles have increased over the years, as well as eagles seen in NJ that were banded in other states. These resightings are important, as they help us to understand eagle movements during the years between fledging and settling into a territory, as well as adult birds at a nest site.
For more info: www.conservewildlifenj.org/blog/2017/12/06/new-jersey-201...
New Jersey Bald Eagle Project Report | 2017 may be downloaded here: www.state.nj.us/dep/fgw/ensp/pdf/eglrpt17.pdf
This week in 2004, the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, Geochemistry, and Ranging spacecraft was launched aboard a Delta II rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Designed and built by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, MESSENGER was the first spacecraft to orbit Mercury. Protected from the intense heat of the Sun by an innovative ceramic-cloth sunshade, MESSENGER provided the first images of the entire planet and collected information on the composition and structure of Mercury's crust, geologic history, atmosphere, magnetosphere, and the makeup of its core and polar materials. The spacecraft arrived at Mercury on March 17, 2011, and impacted the planet's surface April 30, 2015. MESSENGER was part of the Discovery program, managed at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center for the agency's Science Mission Directorate. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA's remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological, and scientific aspects of NASA's activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA's history, visit the Marshall History Program's webpage.
Image credit: NASA
One of the solemn reminders in Gettysburg National Military Park of the price paid by those who gave their lives in the battle that marked the turning point in the American Civil War.
Taken years ago, this photo was re-edited in Corel Paint Shop Pro to take advantage of the program's excellent Tonal Contrast filter.
This week in 1991, space shuttle Atlantis, mission STS-37, landed at Edwards Air Force Base in California following a successful five-day mission. The primary payload -- the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory -- was deployed on the third day of its mission, following an unscheduled spacewalk to manually deploy the observatory’s high-gain antenna. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center designed and managed the Burst and Transient Source Experiment, one of four major science instruments aboard the Compton. Compton was part of the Great Observatories program, which also included the Hubble Space Telescope, the Spitzer Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory. Today, Marshall manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1965, the Saturn I SA-8 mission launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. SA-8 delivered the second of three Pegasus micrometeoroid detection satellites into low-Earth orbit. The satellites, developed and managed by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, electronically recorded the size and frequency of particles in space, and compared the performance of protected and unprotected solar cells. The satellites' data informed future Apollo flights to the Moon. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
APOLLO 17 ASTRONAUT WITH AMERICAN FLAThe voyage of Apollo 17 marked the program’s concluding expedition to the moon. The mission lifted off after midnight on Dec. 7, 1972 from Kennedy Space Center and touched down on the lunar surface on Dec. 11. The crew spent almost 75 hours on the lunar surface, conducted nearly 22 hours of extravehicular activities (EVAs), and traveled almost 19 miles in the Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). During lunar lift-off on Dec. 14, Apollo 17 Mission Commander Eugene A. Cernan remarked that the astronauts were leaving as they came, “with peace and hope for all mankind.” In this photo, taken during the second EVA on Dec. 12, 1972, Cernan is standing near the lunar rover designed by Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
Image credit: NASA/MSFC
Original image: www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/history/gallery/41st_annive...
More Marshall history images:
www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/history/gallery/marshall_hi...
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
This week in 1961, Michoud Assembly Facility was selected as the production site for Saturn rockets. Here, in one of the initial assembly steps for the first stage of the Saturn IB rocket, Michoud workers position a “Spider Beam” to the central liquid-oxygen tank of the S-IB stage. Designed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and built by Chrysler Corp. at Michoud, the S-IB stage used eight H-1 engines to produce a combined thrust of 1.6 million pounds. Today, NASA’s Space Launch System rockets and Orion spacecraft for the first three Artemis missions are being built at Michoud. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1968, the Saturn S-IC-6 arrived at the Mississippi Test Facility -- today’s NASA Stennis Space Center -- from the Michoud Assembly Facility. The S-IC, or first, stage of the Saturn rocket was powered by five F-1 engines, each producing 1.5 million pounds of thrust. The S-IC-6 was employed on the Apollo 11 Saturn V launch vehicle. Here, the S-IC-6 booster was lifted onto its mobile launcher in the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center. Now through December 2022, NASA will mark the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program that landed a dozen astronauts on the Moon between July 1969 and December 1972, and the first U.S. crewed mission -- Apollo 8 -- that circumnavigated the Moon in December 1968. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA's remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA 's activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA's history, visit the Marshall History Program's webpage.
Image credit: NASA
January 12, 2016. The coming snowfall hung like a shroud in the air, a finger-freezing cold high in humidity and still. The snow did come, I left work early to avoid the chaos, and I'll work from home tomorrow. That's a tree on the NRC campus, and the CSIS building in the background.
Accomplishments
- prepared some slides describing a reorganization of the program's core projects.
Yeah. I was a bit of a slacker today. I admit it.
This week in 1966, S-IVB contractor McDonnell Douglas completed factory checkout of the S-IVB-504 flight stage -- used on Apollo 9 -- in Huntington Beach, California. The S-IVB stage was developed under the direction of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and was powered by one J-2 engine capable of producing 225,000 pounds of thrust. Here, the S-IVB-505 and S-IVB-211 are shown in the McDonnell Douglas S-IVB Assembly and Checkout Tower. Apollo 8 was the first manned flight of the Saturn V vehicle and the first manned lunar orbit mission. Now through December 2022, NASA will mark the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program that landed a dozen astronauts on the Moon between July 1969 and December 1972, and the first U.S. crewed mission -- Apollo 8 -- that circumnavigated the Moon in December 1968.The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1967, the first stage of the Apollo 9 Saturn V rocket, S-IC-4, was acceptance fired at Mississippi Test Facility – now known as NASA Stennis Space Center. This was the first flight S-IC to be tested at Mississippi Test Facility. The S-IC stage of the Saturn V was powered by five F-1 engines, each producing 1.5 million pounds of thrust. Here, the S-IC-5, employed on the Apollo 10 mission, is tested at Mississippi Test Facility. The Saturn V was designed at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. Now through December 2022, NASA will mark the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program that landed a dozen astronauts on the Moon between July 1969 and December 1972, and the first U.S. crewed mission -- Apollo 8 -- that circumnavigated the Moon in December 1968. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA's remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA 's activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA's history, visit the Marshall History Program's webpage.
Image credit: NASA
At the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), the fuel tank assembly for the Saturn V S-IC-T (static test stage) fuel tank assembly is mated to the liquid oxygen (LOX) tank in building 4705. This stage underwent numerous static firings at the newly-built S-IC Static Test Stand at the MSFC west test area. The S-IC (first) stage used five F-1 engines that produced a total thrust of 7,500,000 pounds as each engine produced 1,500,000 pounds of thrust. The S-IC stage lifted the Saturn V vehicle and Apollo spacecraft from the launch pad. This July, in a series of special events, NASA is marking the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program – the historic effort that sent the first U.S. astronauts into orbit around the Moon in 1968, and landed a dozen astronauts on the lunar surface between 1969 and 1972. For more pictures, and to connect to NASA’s remarkable history, visit the Marshall History Program’swebpage.
Image credit: NASA
This week in 1999, the STS-96 crew aboard space shuttle Discovery became the first to dock with the International Space Station. Using the Integrated Cargo Carrier, Discovery delivered the Russian cargo crane, STRELA; the SPACEHAB Oceaneering Space System Box; and the American crane, ORU Transfer Device, to the space station. STS-96 was the Space Shuttle Program’s second ISS mission. The first, STS-88, delivered the first American module, Unity, in December 1998. In total, 34 shuttle missions were flown during construction of the space station.
The International Space Station serves as the world’s leading laboratory where researchers conduct cutting-edge research and technology development that will enable human and robotic exploration of destinations beyond low-Earth orbit, including asteroids and Mars. NASA Marshall Space Flight Center’s Payload Operations and Integrations Center serves as the agency’s command center for all science operations on the space station.
The NASA History Program documents and preserves NASA’s remarkable history through a variety of products -- photos, press kits, press releases, mission transcripts and administrators' speeches. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the History Program’s web page.
For more fun throwbacks, check out Marshall's History Album by clicking here.
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
Click here pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2020/2014/
for the program listing and listening link.
The music is a rebroadcast from the program's archive of music for Easter.
This week in 1996, space shuttle Columbia, mission STS-78, launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The mission’s primary payload, the Life and Microgravity Spacelab, was managed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. Here, the spacelab module is loaded into Columbia’s cargo bay. During 17 days of flight, researchers from the United States and Europe shared resources, such as crew time and equipment, to conduct experiments in life science and microgravity investigations. Five space agencies -- NASA, the European Space Agency, the French Space Agency, the Canadian Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency -- along with research scientists from 10 other countries worked together on the design, development and construction of the Life and Microgravity Spacelab. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
Cameron Lake, Waterton Lakes National Park, Alberta, Canada (and a slice of the US)
From my spring 2022 trip to the Northwest--it's a Pano combining three photos taken with my Nikon D810. I didn't notice until the day after uploading this that the lightroom program for creating panoramas didn't do a very good job with the water (probably not the program's fault--the wind likely shifted slightly between shots making a perfect blending impossible). So, I did a little cloning and healing to improve the presentation. Still not perfect, but I don't think anyone would notice a problem unless the stupid photographer POINTED IT OUT! :-)
I was going to name this, "Icebergs Ahead" (for the tiny floating bits of ice) but decided on a more staid title ("staider" is more correct, but it just doesn't have a nice ring to it).
Though I like the clouds here, I would have liked a little more sun (the patches of sunlight seen here are actually shining through a very thin layer of clouds). But what I REALLY would have liked, is less wind. Some reflection on the water would have really improved the shot. But the wind continued to blow this day, and the sun was never really able to punch through.
Note the dead trees on the two hills framing the mountains. They had a terrible fire here in 2017.
A tiny distant portion of the lake is actually over the border with the US and is in Glacier National Park--as is much, perhaps all, of the distant mountain.
"Do these feathers make me look fat?"
NEW JERSEY 2017 BALD EAGLE PROJECT REPORT
ANOTHER PRODUCTIVE YEAR FOR NJ’S EAGLES
by Larissa Smith, CWF Wildlife Biologist
The Conserve Wildlife Foundation of NJ in partnership with the NJ Endangered and Nongame Species Program has released the 2017 NJ Bald Eagle Project Report. In 2017, 178 eagle nests were monitored during the nesting season. Of these nests 153 were active (with eggs) and 25 were territorial or housekeeping pairs. One hundred and ninety young were fledged.
In 2017 the number of active nests was three more than in 2016, but the number young fledged decreased by 27 from a record high of 216 fledged in 2016. The productivity rate this season of 1.25 young/active nest is still above the required range of 0.0 to 1.1 for population maintenance. Productivity could be lower this season for many reasons including weather, predation and disturbance to the nesting area. In 2017 nest monitors reported several instances of “intruder” eagles at nests which did disrupt the nesting attempts of several pairs. One of these “eagle dramas” unfolded at the Duke Farms eagle cam watched by millions of people. An intruder female attempted to replace the current female. This harassment interrupted the pairs bonding and copulation and no eggs were laid.
This year’s report includes a section on Resightings of banded eagles. Resightings of NJ (green) banded eagles have increased over the years, as well as eagles seen in NJ that were banded in other states. These resightings are important, as they help us to understand eagle movements during the years between fledging and settling into a territory, as well as adult birds at a nest site.
For more info: www.conservewildlifenj.org/blog/2017/12/06/new-jersey-201...
New Jersey Bald Eagle Project Report | 2017 may be downloaded here: www.state.nj.us/dep/fgw/ensp/pdf/eglrpt17.pdf
This week in 2012, the International Space Station SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System, or ISERV, launched to the space station from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan. ISERV deploys in the Window Observational Research Facility -- WORF -- rack within the Destiny module of the station. It allows scientists in NASA's SERVIR project to gain experience and expertise in rapid instrument tasking, automated image data acquisition and rapid data downlink. Here, Canadian Space Agency astronaut Chris Hadfield prepares to set up the ISERV in the Destiny module. The ISERV Pathfinder, a camera installed in the WORF, was designed and built at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center as part of the Earth Science Division’s SERVIR project. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological, and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage.
Image credit: NASA
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
The OV-10 Bronco was initially conceived in the early 1960s through an informal collaboration between W. H. Beckett and Colonel K. P. Rice, U.S. Marine Corps, who met at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, California, and who also happened to live near each other. The original concept was for a rugged, simple, close air support aircraft integrated with forward ground operations. At the time, the U.S. Army was still experimenting with armed helicopters, and the U.S. Air Force was not interested in close air support.
The concept aircraft was to operate from expedient forward air bases using roads as runways. Speed was to be from very slow to medium subsonic, with much longer loiter times than a pure jet. Efficient turboprop engines would give better performance than piston engines. Weapons were to be mounted on the centerline to get efficient aiming. The inventors favored strafing weapons such as self-loading recoilless rifles, which could deliver aimed explosive shells with less recoil than cannons, and a lower per-round weight than rockets. The airframe was to be designed to avoid the back blast.
Beckett and Rice developed a basic platform meeting these requirements, then attempted to build a fiberglass prototype in a garage. The effort produced enthusiastic supporters and an informal pamphlet describing the concept. W. H. Beckett, who had retired from the Marine Corps, went to work at North American Aviation to sell the aircraft.
The aircraft's design supported effective operations from forward bases. The OV-10 had a central nacelle containing a crew of two in tandem and space for cargo, and twin booms containing twin turboprop engines. The visually distinctive feature of the aircraft is the combination of the twin booms, with the horizontal stabilizer that connected them at the fin tips. The OV-10 could perform short takeoffs and landings, including on aircraft carriers and large-deck amphibious assault ships without using catapults or arresting wires. Further, the OV-10 was designed to take off and land on unimproved sites. Repairs could be made with ordinary tools. No ground equipment was required to start the engines. And, if necessary, the engines would operate on high-octane automobile fuel with only a slight loss of power.
The aircraft had responsive handling and could fly for up to 5½ hours with external fuel tanks. The cockpit had extremely good visibility for both pilot and co-pilot, provided by a wrap-around "greenhouse" that was wider than the fuselage. North American Rockwell custom ejection seats were standard, with many successful ejections during service. With the second seat removed, the OV-10 could carry 3,200 pounds (1,500 kg) of cargo, five paratroopers, or two litter patients and an attendant. Empty weight was 6,969 pounds (3,161 kg). Normal operating fueled weight with two crew was 9,908 pounds (4,494 kg). Maximum takeoff weight was 14,446 pounds (6,553 kg).
The bottom of the fuselage bore sponsons or "stub wings" that improved flight performance by decreasing aerodynamic drag underneath the fuselage. Normally, four 7.62 mm (.308 in) M60C machine guns were carried on the sponsons, accessed through large forward-opening hatches. The sponsons also had four racks to carry bombs, pods, or fuel. The wings outboard of the engines contained two additional hardpoints, one per side. Racked armament in the Vietnam War was usually seven-shot 2.75 in (70 mm) rocket pods with white phosphorus marker rounds or high-explosive rockets, or 5" (127 mm) four-shot Zuni rocket pods. Bombs, ADSIDS air-delivered/para-dropped unattended seismic sensors, Mk-6 battlefield illumination flares, and other stores were also carried.
Operational experience showed some weaknesses in the OV-10's design. It was significantly underpowered, which contributed to crashes in Vietnam in sloping terrain because the pilots could not climb fast enough. While specifications stated that the aircraft could reach 26,000 feet (7,900 m), in Vietnam the aircraft could reach only 18,000 feet (5,500 m). Also, no OV-10 pilot survived ditching the aircraft.
The OV-10 served in the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Marine Corps, and U.S. Navy, as well as in the service of a number of other countries. In U.S. military service, the Bronco was operated until the early Nineties, and obsoleted USAF OV-10s were passed on to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms for anti-drug operations. A number of OV-10As furthermore ended up in the hands of the California Department of Forestry (CDF) and were used for spotting fires and directing fire bombers onto hot spots.
This was not the end of the OV-10 in American military service, though: In 2012, the type gained new attention because of its unique qualities. A $20 million budget was allocated to activate an experimental USAF unit of two airworthy OV-10Gs, acquired from NASA and the State Department. These machines were retrofitted with military equipment and were, starting in May 2015, deployed overseas to support Operation “Inherent Resolve”, flying more than 120 combat sorties over 82 days over Iraq and Syria. Their concrete missions remained unclear, and it is speculated they provided close air support for Special Forces missions, esp. in confined urban environments where the Broncos’ loitering time and high agility at low speed and altitude made them highly effective and less vulnerable than helicopters.
Furthermore, these Broncos reputedly performed strikes with the experimental AGR-20A “Advanced Precision Kill Weapons System (APKWS)”, a Hydra 70-millimeter rocket with a laser-seeking head as guidance - developed for precision strikes against small urban targets with little collateral damage. The experiment ended satisfactorily, but the machines were retired again, and the small unit was dissolved.
However, the machines had shown their worth in asymmetric warfare, and the U.S. Air Force decided to invest in reactivating the OV-10 on a regular basis, despite the overhead cost of operating an additional aircraft type in relatively small numbers – but development and production of a similar new type would have caused much higher costs, with an uncertain time until an operational aircraft would be ready for service. Re-activating a proven design and updating an existing airframe appeared more efficient.
The result became the MV-10H, suitably christened “Super Bronco” but also known as “Black Pony”, after the program's internal name. This aircraft was derived from the official OV-10X proposal by Boeing from 2009 for the USAF's Light Attack/Armed Reconnaissance requirement. Initially, Boeing proposed to re-start OV-10 manufacture, but this was deemed uneconomical, due to the expected small production number of new serial aircraft, so the “Black Pony” program became a modernization project. In consequence, all airframes for the "new" MV-10Hs were recovered OV-10s of various types from the "boneyard" at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona.
While the revamped aircraft would maintain much of its 1960s-vintage rugged external design, modernizations included a completely new, armored central fuselage with a highly modified cockpit section, ejection seats and a computerized glass cockpit. The “Black Pony” OV-10 had full dual controls, so that either crewmen could steer the aircraft while the other operated sensors and/or weapons. This feature would also improve survivability in case of incapacitation of a crew member as the result from a hit.
The cockpit armor protected the crew and many vital systems from 23mm shells and shrapnel (e. g. from MANPADS). The crew still sat in tandem under a common, generously glazed canopy with flat, bulletproof panels for reduced sun reflections, with the pilot in the front seat and an observer/WSO behind. The Bronco’s original cargo capacity and the rear door were retained, even though the extra armor and defensive measures like chaff/flare dispensers as well as an additional fuel cell in the central fuselage limited the capacity. However, it was still possible to carry and deploy personnel, e. g. small special ops teams of up to four when the aircraft flew in clean configuration.
Additional updates for the MV-10H included structural reinforcements for a higher AUW and higher g load maneuvers, similar to OV-10D+ standards. The landing gear was also reinforced, and the aircraft kept its ability to operate from short, improvised airstrips. A fixed refueling probe was added to improve range and loiter time.
Intelligence sensors and smart weapon capabilities included a FLIR sensor and a laser range finder/target designator, both mounted in a small turret on the aircraft’s nose. The MV-10H was also outfitted with a data link and the ability to carry an integrated targeting pod such as the Northrop Grumman LITENING or the Lockheed Martin Sniper Advanced Targeting Pod (ATP). Also included was the Remotely Operated Video Enhanced Receiver (ROVER) to provide live sensor data and video recordings to personnel on the ground.
To improve overall performance and to better cope with the higher empty weight of the modified aircraft as well as with operations under hot-and-high conditions, the engines were beefed up. The new General Electric CT7-9D turboprop engines improved the Bronco's performance considerably: top speed increased by 100 mph (160 km/h), the climb rate was tripled (a weak point of early OV-10s despite the type’s good STOL capability) and both take-off as well as landing run were almost halved. The new engines called for longer nacelles, and their circular diameter markedly differed from the former Garrett T76-G-420/421 turboprop engines. To better exploit the additional power and reduce the aircraft’s audio signature, reversible contraprops, each with eight fiberglass blades, were fitted. These allowed a reduced number of revolutions per minute, resulting in less noise from the blades and their tips, while the engine responsiveness was greatly improved. The CT7-9Ds’ exhausts were fitted with muzzlers/air mixers to further reduce the aircraft's noise and heat signature.
Another novel and striking feature was the addition of so-called “tip sails” to the wings: each wingtip was elongated with a small, cigar-shaped fairing, each carrying three staggered, small “feather blade” winglets. Reputedly, this installation contributed ~10% to the higher climb rate and improved lift/drag ratio by ~6%, improving range and loiter time, too.
Drawing from the Iraq experience as well as from the USMC’s NOGS test program with a converted OV-10D as a night/all-weather gunship/reconnaissance platform, the MV-10H received a heavier gun armament: the original four light machine guns that were only good for strafing unarmored targets were deleted and their space in the sponsons replaced by avionics. Instead, the aircraft was outfitted with a lightweight M197 three-barrel 20mm gatling gun in a chin turret. This could be fixed in a forward position at high speed or when carrying forward-firing ordnance under the stub wings, or it could be deployed to cover a wide field of fire under the aircraft when it was flying slower, being either slaved to the FLIR or to a helmet sighting auto targeting system.
The original seven hardpoints were retained (1x ventral, 2x under each sponson, and another pair under the outer wings), but the total ordnance load was slightly increased and an additional pair of launch rails for AIM-9 Sidewinders or other light AAMs under the wing tips were added – not only as a defensive measure, but also with an anti-helicopter role in mind; four more Sidewinders could be carried on twin launchers under the outer wings against aerial targets. Other guided weapons cleared for the MV-10H were the light laser-guided AGR-20A and AGM-119 Hellfire missiles, the Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System upgrade to the light Hydra 70 rockets, the new Laser Guided Zuni Rocket which had been cleared for service in 2010, TV-/IR-/laser-guided AGM-65 Maverick AGMs and AGM-122 Sidearm anti-radar missiles, plus a wide range of gun and missile pods, iron and cluster bombs, as well as ECM and flare/chaff pods, which were not only carried defensively, but also in order to disrupt enemy ground communication.
In this configuration, a contract for the conversion of twelve mothballed American Broncos to the new MV-10H standard was signed with Boeing in 2016, and the first MV-10H was handed over to the USAF in early 2018, with further deliveries lasting into early 2020. All machines were allocated to the newly founded 919th Special Operations Support Squadron at Duke Field (Florida). This unit was part of the 919th Special Operations Wing, an Air Reserve Component (ARC) of the United States Air Force. It was assigned to the Tenth Air Force of Air Force Reserve Command and an associate unit of the 1st Special Operations Wing, Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC). If mobilized the wing was gained by AFSOC (Air Force Special Operations Command) to support Special Tactics, the U.S. Air Force's special operations ground force. Similar in ability and employment to Marine Special Operations Command (MARSOC), U.S. Army Special Forces and U.S. Navy SEALs, Air Force Special Tactics personnel were typically the first to enter combat and often found themselves deep behind enemy lines in demanding, austere conditions, usually with little or no support.
The MV-10Hs are expected to provide support for these ground units in the form of all-weather reconnaissance and observation, close air support and also forward air control duties for supporting ground units. Precision ground strikes and protection from enemy helicopters and low-flying aircraft were other, secondary missions for the modernized Broncos, which are expected to serve well into the 2040s. Exports or conversions of foreign OV-10s to the Black Pony standard are not planned, though.
General characteristics:
Crew: 2
Length: 42 ft 2½ in (12,88 m) incl. pitot
Wingspan: 45 ft 10½ in(14 m) incl. tip sails
Height: 15 ft 2 in (4.62 m)
Wing area: 290.95 sq ft (27.03 m²)
Airfoil: NACA 64A315
Empty weight: 9,090 lb (4,127 kg)
Gross weight: 13,068 lb (5,931 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 17,318 lb (7,862 kg)
Powerplant:
2× General Electric CT7-9D turboprop engines, 1,305 kW (1,750 hp) each,
driving 8-bladed Hamilton Standard 8 ft 6 in (2.59 m) diameter constant-speed,
fully feathering, reversible contra-rotating propellers with metal hub and composite blades
Performance:
Maximum speed: 390 mph (340 kn, 625 km/h)
Combat range: 198 nmi (228 mi, 367 km)
Ferry range: 1,200 nmi (1,400 mi, 2,200 km) with auxiliary fuel
Maximum loiter time: 5.5 h with auxiliary fuel
Service ceiling: 32.750 ft (10,000 m)
13,500 ft (4.210 m) on one engine
Rate of climb: 17.400 ft/min (48 m/s) at sea level
Take-off run: 480 ft (150 m)
740 ft (227 m) to 50 ft (15 m)
1,870 ft (570 m) to 50 ft (15 m) at MTOW
Landing run: 490 ft (150 m)
785 ft (240 m) at MTOW
1,015 ft (310 m) from 50 ft (15 m)
Armament:
1x M197 3-barreled 20 mm Gatling cannon in a chin turret with 750 rounds ammo capacity
7x hardpoints for a total load of 5.000 lb (2,270 kg)
2x wingtip launch rails for AIM-9 Sidewinder AAMs
The kit and its assembly:
This fictional Bronco update/conversion was simply spawned by the idea: could it be possible to replace the original cockpit section with one from an AH-1 Cobra, for a kind of gunship version?
The basis is the Academy OV-10D kit, mated with the cockpit section from a Fujimi AH-1S TOW Cobra (Revell re-boxing, though), chosen because of its “boxy” cockpit section with flat glass panels – I think that it conveys the idea of an armored cockpit section best. Combining these parts was not easy, though, even though the plan sound simple. Initially, the Bronco’s twin booms, wings and stabilizer were built separately, because this made PSR on these sections easier than trying the same on a completed airframe. One of the initial challenges: the different engines. I wanted something uprated, and a different look, and I had a pair of (excellent!) 1:144 resin engines from the Russian company Kompakt Zip for a Tu-95 bomber at hand, which come together with movable(!) eight-blade contraprops that were an almost perfect size match for the original three-blade props. Biggest problem: the Tu-95 nacelles have a perfectly circular diameter, while the OV-10’s booms are square and rectangular. Combining these parts and shapes was already a messy PST affair, but it worked out quite well – even though the result rather reminds of some Chinese upgrade measure (anyone know the Tu-4 copies with turboprops? This here looks similar!). But while not pretty, I think that the beafier look works well and adds to the idea of a “revived” aircraft. And you can hardly beat the menacing look of contraprops on anything...
The exotic, so-called “tip sails” on the wings, mounted on short booms, are a detail borrowed from the Shijiazhuang Y-5B-100, an updated Chinese variant/copy of the Antonov An-2 biplane transporter. The booms are simple pieces of sprue from the Bronco kit, the winglets were cut from 0.5mm styrene sheet.
For the cockpit donor, the AH-1’s front section was roughly built, including the engine section (which is a separate module, so that the basic kit can be sold with different engine sections), and then the helicopter hull was cut and trimmed down to match the original Bronco pod and to fit under the wing. This became more complicated than expected, because a) the AH-1 cockpit and the nose are considerably shorter than the OV-10s, b) the AH-1 fuselage is markedly taller than the Bronco’s and c) the engine section, which would end up in the area of the wing, features major recesses, making the surface very uneven – calling for massive PSR to even this out. PSR was also necessary to hide the openings for the Fujimi AH-1’s stub wings. Other issues: the front landing gear (and its well) had to be added, as well as the OV-10 wing stubs. Furthermore, the new cockpit pod’s rear section needed an aerodynamical end/fairing, but I found a leftover Academy OV-10 section from a build/kitbashing many moons ago. Perfect match!
All these challenges could be tackled, even though the AH-1 cockpit looks surprisingly stout and massive on the Bronco’s airframe - the result looks stockier than expected, but it works well for the "Gunship" theme. Lots of PSR went into the new central fuselage section, though, even before it was mated with the OV-10 wing and the rest of the model.
Once cockpit and wing were finally mated, the seams had to disappear under even more PSR and a spinal extension of the canopy had to be sculpted across the upper wing surface, which would meld with the pod’s tail in a (more or less) harmonious shape. Not an easy task, and the fairing was eventually sculpted with 2C putty, plus even more PSR… Looks quite homogenous, though.
After this massive body work, other hardware challenges appeared like small distractions. The landing gear was another major issue because the deeper AH-1 section lowered the ground clearance, also because of the chin turret. To counter this, I raised the OV-10’s main landing gear by ~2mm – not much, but it was enough to create a credible stance, together with the front landing gear transplant under the cockpit, which received an internal console to match the main landing gear’s length. Due to the chin turret and the shorter nose, the front wheel retracts backwards now. But this looks quite plausible, thanks to the additional space under the cockpit tub, which also made a belt feed for the gun’s ammunition supply believable.
To enhance the menacing look I gave the model a fixed refueling boom, made from 1mm steel wire and a receptor adapter sculpted with white glue. The latter stuff was also used add some antenna fairings around the hull. Some antennae, chaff dispensers and an IR decoy were taken from the Academy kit.
The ordnance came from various sources. The Sidewinders under the wing tips were taken from an Italeri F-16C/D kit, they look better than the missiles from the Academy Bronco kit. Their launch rails came from an Italeri Bae Hawk 200. The quadruple Hellfire launchers on the underwing hardpoints were left over from an Italeri AH-1W, and they are a perfect load for this aircraft and its role. The LAU-10 and -19 missile pods on the stub wings were taken from the OV-10 kit.
Painting and markings:
Finding a suitable and somewhat interesting – but still plausible – paint scheme was not easy. Taking the A-10 as benchmark, an overall light grey livery (with focus on low contrast against the sky as protection against ground fire) would have been a likely choice – and in fact the last operational American OV-10s were painted in this fashion. But in order to provide a different look I used the contemporary USAF V-22Bs and Special Operations MC-130s as benchmark, which typically carry a darker paint scheme consisting of FS 36118 (suitably “Gunship Gray” :D) from above, FS 36375 underneath, with a low, wavy waterline, plus low-viz markings. Not spectacular, but plausible – and very similar to the late r/w Colombian OV-10s.
The cockpit tub became Dark Gull Grey (FS 36231, Humbrol 140) and the landing gear white (Revell 301).
The model received an overall black ink washing and some post-panel-shading, to liven up the dull all-grey livery. The decals were gathered from various sources, and I settled for black USAF low-viz markings. The “stars and bars” come from a late USAF F-4, the “IP” tail code was tailored from F-16 markings and the shark mouth was taken from an Academy AH-64. Most stencils came from another Academy OV-10 sheet and some other sources.
Decals were also used to create the trim on the propeller blades and markings on the ordnance.
Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri) and some exhaust soot stains were added with graphite along the tail boom flanks.
A successful transplantation – but is this still a modified Bronco or already a kitbashing? The result looks quite plausible and menacing, even though the TOW Cobra front section appears relatively massive. But thanks to the bigger engines and extended wing tips the proportions still work. The large low-pressure tires look a bit goofy under the aircraft, but they are original. The grey livery works IMHO well, too – a more colorful or garish scheme would certainly have distracted from the modified technical basis.
A Lockheed Martin F-35A-2B "Lightning II" "Joint Strike Fighter" (s/n 12-5056) (MSN AF067) flies alongside a General Dynamics (its aviation unit now part of Lockheed Martin) F-16C Block 42A "Fighting Falcon" (s/n 87-0360) June 25, 2015, at Luke Air Force Base. In October, F-35 and F-16 pilots began integrated training designed to improve mission cooperation and flight skills in both airframes.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.
The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.
The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.
As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".
The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.
The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.
Development
F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.
The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.
By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.
Design
Overview
Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.
Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".
Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".
Improvements
Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:
Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.
Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.
High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.
The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.
Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.
A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.
Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.
Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.
Costs
A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.
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Before getting into A, B, and C differences for the F-35, a short primer on how to tell an F-35 from an F-22 may help avoid an even larger fighter faux pas. After all, the F-22 and F-35 look similar as well, especially from certain angles and at a distance. Both the F-22 and F-35 have two intakes, two tails, and similar planforms.
If the two aircraft happen to be parked together, the F-22, however, is noticeably larger. The Raptor is about ten feet longer than a Lightning II. Its wingspan is about ten feet wider than an F-35A’s and F-35B’s, and roughly the same as an F-35C’s.
From behind, the twin, rectangular thrust-vectoring exhaust nozzles on the F-22 are an obvious difference. The F-35 has one round exhaust nozzle for its single engine. The geometry of the engine intakes distinguishes the two aircraft from the top and side. The Raptor’s intakes angle back. On the Lightning II, they point forward. Intake differences are visible from the front view as well. Opposing sides of the F-22’s intakes are parallel. The corners are slightly rounded. The F-35’s intake angles are sharper. A space between the intake and the fuselage, called a diverter, is found only on the Raptor as well. The F-35’s diverterless intake sits flush to the fuselage.
The single- vs. twin-engine difference plays out on the top sides of the two aircraft as well. The F-22 has two humps between the tails. The F-35 has just one. On the underside, the F-22 is much flatter with one main (though split) weapon bay with two doors. The F-35 is more rounded and has two distinct main weapon bays each with two doors. Taxiing, the F-22 sits about a foot lower than an F-35.
Context also matters. If the airplane in question is operating from an aircraft carrier, landing vertically, taking off in a very short distance, or displaying non-USAF markings, it’s not an F-22.
Context And The F-35 Variants
When it comes to distinguishing among F-35 variants, context can provide some tips as well. If the F-35 in question is being catapulted from a carrier, it’s an F-35C. If it’s landing vertically, it’s an F-35B. If it has Royal Air Force markings, it’s an F-35B. If it has international markings that aren’t associated with the RAF, it’s an F-35A (at least until another international air force procures B or C models).
Basic A, B, & C Differences
The A model is most easily distinguished from other F-35 models by the blister on the upper left side for its internal GAU-22/A Gatling-type gun. (B and C models do not have internal guns.) Like the B model, the F-35A has a smaller wing. The A model is the only F-35 variant with a refueling receptacle on its dorsal spine. The receptacle markings are clearly visible from the top view.
The B model is most easily distinguished from other F-35 models by its vertical lift system. The system comes into play at almost every viewing angle of the aircraft. Even in up-and-away (non vertical) flight, the F-35B has visual clues for the vertical lift system. The lift fan door flattens the upper surface of the F-35 just behind the cockpit, giving this model a distinctive hump. The hump is especially noticeable from front and side perspectives. The lift fan itself abbreviates the aft end of the canopy line as well.
Panel lines and markings are associated with the lift system are visible on the top and bottom sides of the F-35B. From above, panel lines for the lift fan door and the auxiliary air inlet are visible. From below, the doors for lift fan exhaust appear just behind the front landing gear doors. The aft end of the lower fuselage also has a seam for the doors that open when the three-bearing swivel duct goes into action in STOVL mode. (The A and C models have a hump in this location where their arresting/barricade tailhooks are stored.) The B model also has a diamond-shaped roll duct on the underside of each wing.
The C model is most easily distinguished from other F-35 models by its larger wing, which provides almost fifty percent more wing area than the A and B models. The hinge line for the wing fold is visible from top and bottom views. The F-35C wing has an additional control surfaces, called ailerons, on the trailing edge as well (two control surfaces on each wing instead of one). The inner control surfaces on the F-35C wing and the ones on the A and B are called flaperons. The landing gear on the F-35C is noticeable beefier. The nose gear has two tires and a launch bar that extends forward and upward from the wheels.
Another Trick: Markings
Markings can also be used to distinguish F-35 variants. US Air Force markings equate to the A model. US Marines to the B or C model. (The Marine Corps is purchasing eighty C models.) And US Navy to the C model only. The Air Force puts the aircraft identification number, or serial number, on the tail (F-35A). The US Marines and Navy put their identification numbers, called Bureau numbers, on the empennage just below the horizontal tails. To make identification somewhat easier, the F-35 variant designation appears just above the bureau number for the US Marine Corps and Navy. Unfortunately, because of their location these markings are not apparent in most photos. International operators have their own specific requirements for markings.
Other Notes
As noted in a previous Code One article, Norwegian F-35s will be distinguishable by a small, aerodynamically clean bump on the upper fuselage between the two vertical tails. The bump contains a dragchute.
Nosebooms are peculiar to flight test F-35s dedicated to flight sciences testing.
The major differences between the X-35 demonstrator aircraft, which are no longer flying, and F-35 were covered in another previous Code One article.
Basic Cheat Sheet
The F-35A has a small wing, full canopy, gun blister on the left upper side, and aerial refueling receptacle markings on its dorsal. It has no panel lines or markings associated with a STOVL lift system.
The F-35B has a small wing, distinctive fuselage hump and abbreviated canopy (thanks to the lift fan), refueling probe on the right side, and numerous markings, panel lines, and actual hardware associated with its vertical lift system.
The F-35C has the big wing, wing folds, ailerons, full canopy, refueling probe on the right side, and a launch bar and two tires on the front landing gear. If the aircraft has Navy markings, it’s an F-35C.
F-35A aircraft AL-1 and an Italian Air Force KC-767 tanker come in for a landing at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland to complete the F-35 program’s first trans-Atlantic flight on Feb. 5, 2016. Learn more: bit.ly/1SEcue0
cachemash tutorial
by H.Manon
Cachemashing is my name for a somewhat more controlled approach to what Daniel Temkin identified as the Photoshop Truncating Glitch—an approach to image glitching that exploits a problem with early versions of Photoshop. Cachemashing is in my view a relatively pure or true form of glitching, because my control over the outcome is limited almost exclusively to the selection of input files, and to standard user-end changes to Photoshop settings. Once these decisions are made, Photoshop glitches a truncated jpeg file in ways that are difficult and at times impossible to predict. However, what makes this technique compelling is that, through practice, one may nonetheless develop and refine a personal approach, even if the final cause of the glitch remains opaque—a mystery taking place behind-the-scenes of Photoshop’s interface.
I want to preface what follows by saying that I am not a programmer. Although I am fairly savvy as a Photoshop user, my understanding of the program’s internal workings are almost nil. I'm sure if I knew more about the causes of this technique I would be less interested in it. The fun here is really in the "not knowing why."
In this tutorial I mainly describe how I arrived at the image above (a glitched “Currier and Ives” style print of a duck hunt). These specific techniques could be altered in numerous ways and still produce the effect of a cachemash.
What you need to cachemash:
1) Photoshop 6.0 or earlier. I am running Photoshop Elements 1.0, which is the Elements version that corresponds with PS 6.0. My system is Windows XP, and I know that the technique also works when Photoshop 6.0 (or PE 1.0) is installed on Vista. I have not tested this technique on any other OS.
2) A truncated jpeg file in which the point of truncation appears close to the top, resulting in a mostly “blank” image when opened in PS. Jpegs are easy to truncate using code editing programs like Notepad++. My approach is to open the jpeg in Notepad++, delete a couple of lines of data somewhere just below the file header, save, and then open in PS. You have succeeded when you open the file and receive the golden message “This document may be damaged (the file may be truncated or incomplete). Continue?” Sometimes it takes ten or so tries to successfully truncate the file, rendering it partially damaged, but not too damaged to open.
3) At least one non-truncated image file that you want to form the mashed-up content of the final image. These are the files you will load into the PS cache.
4) A computer that has sufficient speed and RAM to process the size of image you want to produce.
The procedure:
1) Open a truncated jpeg in Photoshop. The truncated file I used for the “duck hunt” cachemash is 4500 x 4822 pixels @ 300 ppi. The compression rate of the truncated file does not seem to matter. The original image content also does not seem to matter, since the truncation renders it blank.
2) The message pops up: “This document may be damaged (the file may be truncated or incomplete). Continue?” Click OK. You will see a blacked-out image, with perhaps a tiny line of color at the top (depending on how near to the top you truncated the file).
3) Now is when you can get creative, in a fascinatingly limited way. Open any file or set of files. Manipulate them as usual in PS, or not. Then close them. For the “duck hunt” image, I pre-sized a jpeg at a width of 8984 (almost but not quite twice the width of the truncated file). This is the trick to obtaining something like a “full frame” cachemash in which the cached image is fully or mostly visible in the final version.
4) Use the filter called Gaussian Blur on the truncated file. A blur radius setting of 0.1 pixels is ideal. This procedure “fixes” the mashed image, in the photographic sense of the word; it stabilizes the data which, up to now, tended to load randomly into the void space of truncated file. The result is a mash-up of certain files and parts of files that have been temporarily stored in the PS cache. (Note: I use Gaussian Blur at 0.1 because of all the possible filters, this one seems to least alter the final image, while still “fixing” it. However virtually every PS filter will "fix" a truncated file).
5) The truncated file is now cachemashed. If you like the results, save to the file format of your choice.
6) Undoing the Gaussian Blur returns the truncated file to its volatile state.
7) Redoing the Gaussian Blur will give new results each time. However (and this is what makes the technique really interesting), the more you undo and redo, the more your “fixed” images also become part of the PS cache. You might think of this as “caching the cache.” If you undo and redo fifty times, the image will be really minced up. But, if at any point you open a new non-truncated jpeg in PS, that jpeg will become part of the cache, and may appear largely in tact as a portion or layer of the mashed image.
Some other tips and observations:
1) In the process of doing and undoing, you will see that when the PS cache attempts to “fill in” the truncated image, it does so in a cycle. The length of the cache cycle is controlled by the size of the cache you elect in Preferences > Memory & Image Cache. I mostly keep cache levels set at 8 (this is max) and RAM used by PS set at 100%. Striking embroidery-like effects can be achieved by reducing RAM used by PS down to 15% or so.
2) Incorporating high contrast RGB images (color or b/w, doesn’t matter) yields brighter colors in the final “fixed” version. Low contrast images produce subtler, more muted colors.
3) Introducing Inverted (i.e. negativized) images to the cache produces interesting results, as do images to which Gradient Map has been applied.
4) It is very unusual to produce a final cachemash that is grayscale, but it sometimes happens.
5) The non-truncated sliver of the truncated file will appear as a black band at the top of the final “fixed” version. I usually crop this out, but this is the only post-processing I do. All of the other effects in images I have posted to Flickr happened prior to the moment of glitching, which I take to be the moment at which PS “fixes” the images.
6) It is possible to create the same cachemash twice. Just open the same files in the same order with the same settings on the same machine. This suggests that there is nothing random about cachemashing. At the same time, if you begin by caching an image that is even one pixel larger or smaller, the results after several cycles of do-and-undo could be radically different.
7) If you overlay the PS crop tool on top of a truncated file, and there is data in the cache, the space within the cropped area will weirdly animate. When you press “crop,” the animation will stop because the image is now fixed.
8) When the final colors you achieve are saturated reds, blues and greens, it is sometimes possible to experience the optical illusion called chromostereopsis.
I will continue to add observations on this page as they come to me.
Good luck!
HM
Capt. Andrew “Dojo” Olson, Lockheed Martin F-35 "Lightning II" 'Heritage Flight Team' pilot and commander, performs a high-speed pass during the Canadian International Air Show in Toronto, Sept. 1, 2018.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.
The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.
The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.
As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".
The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.
The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.
Development
F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.
The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.
By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.
Design
Overview
Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.
Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".
Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".
Improvements
Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:
Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms
Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes
High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.
The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.
Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system
A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft
Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency
Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.
Costs
A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.
A Lockheed Martin F-35A-2B "Lightning II" "Joint Strike Fighter" (s/n 12-5056) (MSN AF067) flies alongside a General Dynamics (its aviation unit now part of Lockheed Martin) F-16C Block 42A "Fighting Falcon" (s/n 87-0360) June 25, 2015, at Luke Air Force Base. In October, F-35 and F-16 pilots began integrated training designed to improve mission cooperation and flight skills in both airframes.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.
The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.
The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.
As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".
The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.
The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.
Development
F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.
The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.
By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.
Design
Overview
Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.
Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".
Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".
Improvements
Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:
Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.
Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.
High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.
The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.
Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.
A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.
Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.
Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.
Costs
A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.
...................................................................................................
Before getting into A, B, and C differences for the F-35, a short primer on how to tell an F-35 from an F-22 may help avoid an even larger fighter faux pas. After all, the F-22 and F-35 look similar as well, especially from certain angles and at a distance. Both the F-22 and F-35 have two intakes, two tails, and similar planforms.
If the two aircraft happen to be parked together, the F-22, however, is noticeably larger. The Raptor is about ten feet longer than a Lightning II. Its wingspan is about ten feet wider than an F-35A’s and F-35B’s, and roughly the same as an F-35C’s.
From behind, the twin, rectangular thrust-vectoring exhaust nozzles on the F-22 are an obvious difference. The F-35 has one round exhaust nozzle for its single engine. The geometry of the engine intakes distinguishes the two aircraft from the top and side. The Raptor’s intakes angle back. On the Lightning II, they point forward. Intake differences are visible from the front view as well. Opposing sides of the F-22’s intakes are parallel. The corners are slightly rounded. The F-35’s intake angles are sharper. A space between the intake and the fuselage, called a diverter, is found only on the Raptor as well. The F-35’s diverterless intake sits flush to the fuselage.
The single- vs. twin-engine difference plays out on the top sides of the two aircraft as well. The F-22 has two humps between the tails. The F-35 has just one. On the underside, the F-22 is much flatter with one main (though split) weapon bay with two doors. The F-35 is more rounded and has two distinct main weapon bays each with two doors. Taxiing, the F-22 sits about a foot lower than an F-35.
Context also matters. If the airplane in question is operating from an aircraft carrier, landing vertically, taking off in a very short distance, or displaying non-USAF markings, it’s not an F-22.
Context And The F-35 Variants
When it comes to distinguishing among F-35 variants, context can provide some tips as well. If the F-35 in question is being catapulted from a carrier, it’s an F-35C. If it’s landing vertically, it’s an F-35B. If it has Royal Air Force markings, it’s an F-35B. If it has international markings that aren’t associated with the RAF, it’s an F-35A (at least until another international air force procures B or C models).
Basic A, B, & C Differences
The A model is most easily distinguished from other F-35 models by the blister on the upper left side for its internal GAU-22/A Gatling-type gun. (B and C models do not have internal guns.) Like the B model, the F-35A has a smaller wing. The A model is the only F-35 variant with a refueling receptacle on its dorsal spine. The receptacle markings are clearly visible from the top view.
The B model is most easily distinguished from other F-35 models by its vertical lift system. The system comes into play at almost every viewing angle of the aircraft. Even in up-and-away (non vertical) flight, the F-35B has visual clues for the vertical lift system. The lift fan door flattens the upper surface of the F-35 just behind the cockpit, giving this model a distinctive hump. The hump is especially noticeable from front and side perspectives. The lift fan itself abbreviates the aft end of the canopy line as well.
Panel lines and markings are associated with the lift system are visible on the top and bottom sides of the F-35B. From above, panel lines for the lift fan door and the auxiliary air inlet are visible. From below, the doors for lift fan exhaust appear just behind the front landing gear doors. The aft end of the lower fuselage also has a seam for the doors that open when the three-bearing swivel duct goes into action in STOVL mode. (The A and C models have a hump in this location where their arresting/barricade tailhooks are stored.) The B model also has a diamond-shaped roll duct on the underside of each wing.
The C model is most easily distinguished from other F-35 models by its larger wing, which provides almost fifty percent more wing area than the A and B models. The hinge line for the wing fold is visible from top and bottom views. The F-35C wing has an additional control surfaces, called ailerons, on the trailing edge as well (two control surfaces on each wing instead of one). The inner control surfaces on the F-35C wing and the ones on the A and B are called flaperons. The landing gear on the F-35C is noticeable beefier. The nose gear has two tires and a launch bar that extends forward and upward from the wheels.
Another Trick: Markings
Markings can also be used to distinguish F-35 variants. US Air Force markings equate to the A model. US Marines to the B or C model. (The Marine Corps is purchasing eighty C models.) And US Navy to the C model only. The Air Force puts the aircraft identification number, or serial number, on the tail (F-35A). The US Marines and Navy put their identification numbers, called Bureau numbers, on the empennage just below the horizontal tails. To make identification somewhat easier, the F-35 variant designation appears just above the bureau number for the US Marine Corps and Navy. Unfortunately, because of their location these markings are not apparent in most photos. International operators have their own specific requirements for markings.
Other Notes
As noted in a previous Code One article, Norwegian F-35s will be distinguishable by a small, aerodynamically clean bump on the upper fuselage between the two vertical tails. The bump contains a dragchute.
Nosebooms are peculiar to flight test F-35s dedicated to flight sciences testing.
The major differences between the X-35 demonstrator aircraft, which are no longer flying, and F-35 were covered in another previous Code One article.
Basic Cheat Sheet
The F-35A has a small wing, full canopy, gun blister on the left upper side, and aerial refueling receptacle markings on its dorsal. It has no panel lines or markings associated with a STOVL lift system.
The F-35B has a small wing, distinctive fuselage hump and abbreviated canopy (thanks to the lift fan), refueling probe on the right side, and numerous markings, panel lines, and actual hardware associated with its vertical lift system.
The F-35C has the big wing, wing folds, ailerons, full canopy, refueling probe on the right side, and a launch bar and two tires on the front landing gear. If the aircraft has Navy markings, it’s an F-35C.
10 Cool Facts About NASA's Space Shuttle Discovery
- By Mike Wall, Space.com Senior Writer
1. World's Most-Flown Space Shuttle
Discovery flew 39 space missions during its operational life, the first in 1984 and the last one in 2011. It notched more spaceflights than any other space shuttle, or any other spacecraft for that matter.
2. Discovery Spent Entire Year in Orbit
Over the course of its 39 missions, Discovery logged a total of 365 days in space. It also put 148,221,675 miles on its odometer, another space shuttle record. The miles traveled by Discovery could have carried it to the moon and back more than 300 times.
3. Discovery Is Really Dirty
Discovery's somewhat dingy appearance surprises many people who see the venerable orbiter up close. The many marks on the shuttle are a testament to its long career and many spaceflights, NASA officials say.
"When you look at her up close, she does look worn," said NASA's Stephanie Stilson, who managed Discovery's processing flow between the orbiter's missions from 2000 to 2011. "There are discolorations and streaks from going from orbit back into our environment here."
4. Discovery Launched the Hubble Space Telescope
Astronauts aboard Discovery deployed NASA's Hubble Space Telescope on the shuttle's STS-31 mission in April 1990. Twenty-two years — and numerous repair missions — later, the instrument continues to snap stunning photos that help reshape our understanding of the cosmos.
5. Discovery Returned NASA From Shuttle Tragedies
Discovery was the first shuttle to launch after each of the shuttle program's tragedies, the January 1986 explosion of Challenger and the Feburary 2003 destruction of Columbia as it re-entered Earth's atmosphere. Each disaster took the lives of all seven astronauts aboard. In both cases, the shuttle program took several years to get back on its feet. Discovery's return-to-flight missions launched in September 1988 and July 2005, respectively.
6. Discovery Launched John Glenn Back Into Orbit
Discovery is the only shuttle ever to fly one of the Mercury Seven — NASA's first astronaut class, which was chosen in 1959. The orbiter carried John Glenn on its STS-95 mission in October 1998, when the astronaut was 77. Glenn thus became the oldest person ever to reach space; 36 years earlier, in 1962, he had become the first American to orbit Earth.
7. Discovery Took Four Years to Build
Work began on Discovery in 1979, and the shuttle wasn't completed until October 1983 in Palmdale, Calif. It was then flown aboard a 747 carrier aircraft to NASA's Kennedy Space Center, where it launched on its maiden mission in August 1984.
8. Launched 1st Female Shuttle Pilot & Commander
Discovery was the first American spacecraft to be piloted by a woman. NASA astronaut Eileen Collins piloted the shuttle's STS-63 mission in 1995, which rendezvoused with Russia's Mir space station. (Collins became the first female shuttle commander in history on Columbia's STS-93 mission in 1999, which deployed NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.)
9. Launched 1st Russian to Ride a U.S. Spaceship
Discovery also carried the first Russian cosmonaut ever to launch in an American spacecraft. Sergei Krikalev flew aboard the orbiter on its STS-60 mission in 1994, the first effort in the joint U.S./Russian Shuttle-Mir program.
10. Discovery's Name Has Long Exploration Legacy
NASA's space-flown orbiters were all named after historic oceangoing research or exploration vessels. Discovery takes its name from two ships that loom large in the history of exploration. One was sailed by Henry Hudson in 1610-11 to search for a northwest passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and the other was helmed by James Cook on an 18th-century voyage during which he discovered the Hawaiian Islands.
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This photo may not be used in any form without permission from the photographer. None of my images are in the Creative Commons. If you wish to use one of my images please contact me at: skipplittphotography@gmail.com
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Dan Small of Washington College and landowner Harry Sears use a controlled fire to manage part of a warm season grassland at Chino Farms in Queen Anne's County, Md., on April 13, 2016. The grassland is ideal habitat for northern bobwhite quail. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)
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Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft sits atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 41 in Florida on Dec. 5, 2019, for the program’s first-ever Integrated Day of Launch Test the following day. The rocket’s booster and Centaur upper stage will be filled with propellants for a full run-through of the launch countdown. The rehearsal is practice for Boeing’s upcoming uncrewed Orbital Flight Test to the International Space Station for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. Photo credit: NASA/Frank Michaux
This visualization shows the extent of Arctic sea ice on Aug. 26, 2012, the day the sea ice dipped to its smallest extent ever recorded in more than three decades of satellite measurements, according to scientists from NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The data is from the U.S. Defense Meteorological Satellite Program’s Special Sensor Microwave/Imager. The line on the image shows the average minimum extent from the period covering 1979-2010, as measured by satellites. Every summer the Arctic ice cap melts down to what scientists call its “minimum” before colder weather builds the ice cover back up. The size of this minimum remains in a long-term decline. The extent on Aug. 26. 2012 broke the previous record set on Sept. 18, 2007. But the 2012 melt season could still continue for several weeks.
To read more go to: 1.usa.gov/PkgRuq
Image credit: Scientific Visualization Studio, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) announced on Aug. 27, 2012, that the ice cap covering the Arctic Ocean is now smaller than ever recorded since consistent satellite measurements of the ice began more than three decades ago. Each year, the ice cap goes through a shrink-and-swell cycle, melting throughout the summer months before expanding through fall and winter. In the past decade in particular the minimum summertime extent of the ice cap has shown a consistent decline in size – a trend closely linked with the Arctic's warming climate. NASA and NSIDC scientists said the extent of Arctic sea ice on Aug. 26 surpassed the previous record minimum extent set in the summer of 2007. The ice cap will continue to melt and get smaller in the coming weeks before temperatures get colder and ice begins to refreeze as fall approaches.
NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) announced on Aug. 27, 2012, that the ice cap covering the Arctic Ocean is now smaller than ever recorded since consistent satellite measurements of the ice began more than three decades ago. Each year, the ice cap goes through a shrink-and-swell cycle, melting throughout the summer months before expanding through fall and winter. In the past decade in particular the minimum summertime extent of the ice cap has shown a consistent decline in size – a trend closely linked with the Arctic's warming climate. NASA and NSIDC scientists said the extent of Arctic sea ice on Aug. 26 surpassed the previous record minimum extent set in the summer of 2007. The ice cap will continue to melt and get smaller in the coming weeks before temperatures get colder and ice begins to refreeze as fall approaches.
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
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F-35A aircraft AL-1, the first international jet built outside the U.S. at the Cameri, Italy, Final Assembly & Check-Out (FACO) facility, completes the program’s first trans-Atlantic flight as it comes in for a landing at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland on Feb. 5, 2016. Learn more: bit.ly/1SEcue0
The X-51A Waverider flew its fourth and final mission May 1 over the Point Mugu Naval Air Warfare Center Sea Range May 1, 2013,during which the test team achieved a record-setting 210 seconds of air-breathing hypersonic flight. Flight testers from Edwards Air Force Base, Cali., played a vital role in the program's success. (U.S. Air Force photo by Bobbi Zapka/Released)
A manta trawl skims the surface of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland on Sept. 4, 2015. Julie Lawson of Trash Free Maryland and Stiv Wilson of The Story of Stuff Project invited advocates, educators, journalists, officials and others onboard for 13 days of sampling for microplastic, which animals can accidentally consume and which can release chemical pollutants. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)
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Florence Shelly Preserve in Susquehanna County, Pa., on Aug. 2, 2016. The 357-acre preserve is owned by the Nature Conservancy and features forest, fields, a stream, and glacial pond surrounded by a floating bog. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)
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F-35A aircraft AL-1 and an Italian Air Force KC-767 tanker come in for a landing at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland to complete the F-35 program’s first trans-Atlantic flight on Feb. 5, 2016. Learn more: bit.ly/1S Ecue0
The Mohonk Mountain House, also known as Lake Mohonk Mountain House, is an American resort hotel located on the Shawangunk Ridge in Ulster County, New York. Its location in the town of New Paltz, New York is just beyond the southern border of the Catskill Mountains, west of the Hudson River.
The National Historic Landmark Program's "Statement of Significance", as of the site's historic landmark designation in 1986, stated:
Begun in the 1870s as a small resort for family and friends by the Smiley brothers, it became so popular that it was enlarged many times. Because of the Smileys' love of the outdoor life, the area around the hotel was treated as an integral part of the attractions of the resort. Much of this area was planned as an experiment in conservation of the natural environment, and as an educational tool for the study of botany, geology, and outdoor living.
The resort is located on the shore of Lake Mohonk, which is half a mile (800 m) long and 60 feet (18 m) deep. The main structure was built by Quaker twin brothers Albert and Alfred Smiley between 1869 and 1910.
From 1883 to 1916, annual conferences took place at Mohonk Mountain House, sponsored by Albert Smiley, to improve the living standards of Native American Indian populations. These meetings brought together government representatives of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the House and Senate committees on Indian Affairs, as well as educators, philanthropists, and Indian leaders to discuss the formulation of policy. The Haverford College library holds 22,000 records from the 34 conference reports for researchers and students of American history.
The hotel hosted the Lake Mohonk Conference on International Arbitration between 1895 and 1916, which was instrumental in creating the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, Netherlands. Those conference papers were donated by the Smiley Family to Swarthmore College for research.
The house was given a United Nations Environment Programme Award in 1994 in honor of "125 years of stewardship". According to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, "Through its buildings and roads, its land, and its spirit, Mohonk exemplifies America's history and culture. Mohonk has since managed to maintain its 19th century character into the 21st century."
The resort was sued in 2014 by 200 guests who had become ill in a norovirus outbreak after staying there, who claimed the owners of the Mohonk Mountain House had been aware of the gastrointestinal illness at the resort prior to the arrival of the guests. The guests accused Mohonk of “intentional, willful, wanton, illegal ... and deliberate disregard for the health, safety and rights of plaintiffs.” The resort settled the claims for $875,000 two years later.
Description
Mohonk Mountain House has 259 guest rooms, including 28 tower rooms, an indoor pool and spa, and an outdoor ice-skating rink for winter use. The property consists of 1,325 acres (536 ha), and much of it is landscaped with meadows and gardens. It adjoins the Mohonk Preserve, which is crisscrossed by 85 miles (140 km) of hiking trails and carriage roads. The Smileys conveyed the majority of their property to the preserve.
The Mohonk Mountain House has hosted many famous visitors including industrialist John D. Rockefeller, naturalist John Burroughs, industrialist Andrew Carnegie, and American presidents Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, Rutherford B. Hayes, Chester A. Arthur, and Bill Clinton. Guests have also included former First Lady Julia Grant, author Thomas Mann, and religious leaders such as Rabbi Louis Finkelstein, Reverend Ralph W. Sockman, Reverend Francis Edward Clark. `Abdu'l-Bahá, the eldest son of Bahá'í Faith founder Bahá'u'lláh, stayed there in 1912 during the Lake Mohonk Conference on International Arbitration as part of his journeys to the West.
from Wikipedia
With more than 23 times the power output of the Hoover Dam, the Constellation Program's Ares I-X test rocket zooms off Launch Complex 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The rocket produces 2.96 million pounds of thrust at liftoff and reaches a speed of 100 mph in eight seconds. Liftoff of the 6-minute flight test was at 11:30 a.m. EDT Oct. 28. This was the first launch from Kennedy's pads of a vehicle other than the space shuttle since the Apollo Program's Saturn rockets were retired. The parts used to make the Ares I-X booster flew on 30 different shuttle missions ranging from STS-29 in 1989 to STS-106 in 2000. The data returned from more than 700 sensors throughout the rocket will be used to refine the design of future launch vehicles and bring NASA one step closer to reaching its exploration goals.
Image credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett
Original image:
mediaarchive.ksc.nasa.gov/detail.cfm?mediaid=43944
More about Ares I-X: www.nasa.gov/aresIX
p.s. You can see all of the Ares photos in the Ares Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/ares/ We'd love to have you as a member!
The 2016 Chesapeake Executive Council meeting is held on Oct. 4, 2016 at the Blandy Experimental Farm in Boyce, Virginia. It was announced that Pennsylvania will have $28 million in the next year to combat agricultural pollution, with $12.7 million coming from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, $4 million from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and $11.8 coming mostly from shifts within the Pennsylvania budget. (Photo by Leslie Boorhem-Stephenson/Chesapeake Bay Program)
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An Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II taxis down the flightline before a quarterly load crew competition at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., Jan. 10, 2019. Six different aircraft maintenance units from Luke AFB competed in the 56th Fighter Wing Quarterly Load Crew Competition which evaluates technical proficiency, safety procedures and overall time to load munitions onto respective aircraft.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.
The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.
The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.
As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".
The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.
The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.
Development
F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.
The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.
By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.
Design
Overview
Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.
Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".
Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".
Improvements
Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:
Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms
Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes
High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.
The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.
Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system
A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft
Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency
Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.
Costs
A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.