BF-4 Flt 511 Sqn Ldr Andy Edgell and BF-5 Flt 374 Mr. Peter Wilson, Night flying aboard HMS Queen Elizabeth on 29 Sep 2018

  

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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.

The United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) spacecraft onboard is seen on Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013 at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) mission is a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey that will continue the Landsat Program's 40-year data record of monitoring the Earth's landscapes from space. The spacecraft is scheduled to launch Feb. 11. (201302100012HQ)

 

Photo Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

 

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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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The Space Shuttle Discovery (OV-103) was one of only five fully functioning orbiters from NASA's Space Shuttle program to be built. Construction began on Discovery in January 1979 and was delivered to NASA in November 1983. Her first mission, STS-41-D, flew from August 30th to September 5th, 1984. Over her 27-year-long career with NASA, she would launch and land 39 times, gathering more spaceflights than any other spacecraft in history. Like the other shuttles, it had three main components: the orbiter, a central fuel tank, and two rocket boosters. Nearly 25,000 heat-resistant tiles cover the spacecraft for protection from incredibly high temperatures upon re-entering into Earth’s atmosphere.

 

Discovery would become the third operational orbiter to enter service with NASA, preceded by Columbia and Challenger, respectively. She embarked on her final mission, STS-133, on February 24th, 2011, and touched down for the last time at Kennedy Space Center on March 9th, 2011. Discovery performed research and International Space Station (ISS) assembly missions and carried the Hubble Space Telescope into orbit.

 

The name Discovery was chosen to carry on a tradition based on ships of exploration, primarily HMS Discovery, one of the ships commanded by Captain James Cook during his third and final major voyage from 1776-1779, and Henry Hudson's Discovery, which was used from 1610–1611 to explore the Hudson Bay and search for the Northwest Passage. Other ships bearing the name have included HMS Discovery of the 1875–1876 British Arctic Expedition to the North Pole and the RRS Discovery, which led the 1901–1904 "Discovery Expedition" to Antarctica. Discovery launched the Hubble Space Telescope and conducted the 2nd and 3rd Hubble service missions. It also launched the Ulysses probe and 3 TDRS satellites.

 

Discovery was chosen twice as the "Return To Flight" Orbiter, first in 1988 after the loss of Shuttle Challenger in 1986, and then again for the twin "Return To Flight" missions in July 2005 and 2006 after the Columbia disaster in 2003. Project Mercury astronaut John Glenn, 77 years old at the time, flew with Discovery on STS-95 in 1998, making him the oldest person in American history to fly into outer space.

 

NASA had plans to launch United States Department of Defense payloads from Vandenberg Air Force Base. If everything had been planned accordingly, Discovery would have become the dedicated U.S. Air Force shuttle. Her first West Coast mission, STS-62-A, was scheduled for 1986, but these plans were quickly canceled after the Challenger disaster.

 

By the time the Discovery was retired after completing her final mission, she had flown upwards of 149 million miles on 39 missions, completed 5,830 orbits, and spent 365 days in orbit over 27 years. Discovery had flown more flights than all other orbiters combined, including four in 1985 alone. Discovery would fly all three "return to flight" missions after the Challenger and Columbia disasters: STS-41 (1988), STS-114 (2005), and STS-121 (2006). Discovery also flew the Space Shuttle program's ante-penultimate mission, launching on February 24, 2011. Endeavour flew STS-134, and Atlantis performed STS-135, NASA's final Space Shuttle mission. On February 24th, 2011, Discovery was launched from Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39-A to begin its last orbital flight.

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)

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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.

 

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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

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

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PUGET SOUND, Wash. (April 2, 2018) The Blue crew of the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine USS Nebraska (SSBN 739) transits the Hood Canal as it returns to its homeport following a test launch of two unarmed Trident II D5 missiles off the coast of California. The test launch was part of the U.S. Navy Strategic Systems Program’s demonstration and shakedown operation certification process. The successful launch certified the readiness of an SSBN crew and the operational performance of the submarine’s strategic weapons system before returning to operational availability. Nebraska is one of eight ballistic missile submarines stationed at Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor providing the most survivable leg of the strategic deterrence triad for the United States. (U.S. Navy photo by Lt. Cmdr. Michael L. Smith)

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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The Chesapeake Bay Program's photographic archive is available for media and non-commercial use at no charge. To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

A photo credit mentioning the Chesapeake Bay Program is mandatory. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way or used in any way that suggests approval or endorsement of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Requestors should also respect the publicity rights of individuals photographed, and seek their consent if necessary.

A typical Batopilas Centro street upgraded with Pueblo Magico money. Improved sidewalk and street finishings and characteristic rich colour treatment of the buildings are the kind of enhancements provided by the program.

 

Pueblos Magico:

With tourism being Mexico’s third major industry, the country’s government has developed several programs to support this important, dollar-generating sector. One of them, called Pueblos Magicos (Magical Towns), aims to increase tourism to towns that are of particular historic or religious value, or that are located near large cities or other tourist sites.

 

Founded in 2001 by the Tourism Secretariat (Sectur), the Pueblos Magicos program coordinates local, state, and federal efforts, channeling funds for diversification and improvement of the towns’ tourism infrastructure.

 

The idea behind this Sectur’s project is to show that Mexico is much more than just sun and beach. Converting quaint, culturally rich towns into visitor-friendly destinations, the government wants to make sure they retain their authentic Mexican charm, which is ultimately what sets them apart from other destinations.

 

One of the program’s most important challenges is to maintain the town’s historical accuracy throughout the modernization process, and because of that all participating towns must comply with architectural and visual guidelines.

Fungi grow in the forest at the Ned Smith Center for Nature and Art near Millersburg, Pa., on Oct. 28, 2016. Fungi play a major role in regenerating the forest by digesting fallen trees and plant matter, effectively recycling the nutrients back into the soil. (Photo by Leslie Boorhem-Stephenson/Chesapeake Bay Program)

 

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The Chesapeake Bay Program's photographic archive is available for media and non-commercial use at no charge.

 

To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

A photo credit mentioning the Chesapeake Bay Program is mandatory. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way or used in any way that suggests approval or endorsement of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Requestors should also respect the publicity rights of individuals photographed, and seek their consent if necessary.

In the biblical story of Jacob, from Genesis 28, Jacob witnesses angels ascending and descending a ladder from heaven. But in the painting the ladder doesn't come from heaven, but from a dark, round object emitting multi-colored lights. Though Jacob's Ladder is a popular symbol in freemasonry, is this rendering pointing to something more of an extraterrestrial nature? According to ancient astronaut theorists, Jacob's Ladder was nothing more than a ramp or a device with which to reach the realm of the gods, and the 'gods' were extraterrestrials.Traditional Christianity (most notably, CS Lewis) believes that extraterrestrial beings are simply angels, whether fallen or holy. The relatively new Indiana Jones movie, The Kingdom of the Skulls, say that aliens are not really extraterrestrial, but extradimensional. That describes what the Bible says about spiritual powers. According to the Air Force Project Blue Book, the unexplained percentage of encounters fit a spiritual, occult phenomenon. Some go on to say that alien beings are ultraterrestrial, meaning to say that these beings live among us and are what humans are to bears; both live on Earth, but don't interact; it'd be a stretch to say that a bear would comprehend being abducted in a human airplane. In a way, He is not a human (except through the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ). to us that He is a different Being altogether. But He is not a Grey or a Reptilian or Annunaki or biological or even matter; He is Spirit. Angels obviously ride on disc vehicles according to the Bible, and mainstream Christianity classifies aliens as spiritual beings of angels, not a science fiction astrobiological derivative. The medieval Dante notions of angels and demons of harping cherubs and horned devils must be overthrown.Assume there are beings besides humans, hailing from other worlds (universes?). This does not say anything about G-d, just the way some people stumbled upon backward tribes who thought the white men were gods, has nothing to do with the reality of G-d. It's agree that Ezekiel (and Jacob's ladder) speak of some form of aliens, from space. But their meaning does not change the reality of G-d. It does throw into question what people back then thought about angels. Still, their understanding of "UFO's" do not need to influence ours. In conclusion, it doesn't interfere with my beliefs. The ancient alien theory fails in that it classifies the aliens and UFOs as biological and materialistic, not spiritual. One of the more convoluted priest-written myths that make up the Old Testament book of Genesis is that of Jacob, the younger of twin boys who, nonetheless, received through fraud and deceit the blessings of first-born. This is the much revered ancestor of the “chosen” ones. There is hidden meaning in all of this, of course, but the focus for this blog is why this character’s name was changed to Israel. It is all inexplicably mixed in with an alleged wrestling match with an angel and a “dream” about a ladder upon which angels were seen to move up and down between heaven and Earth. The story of Jacob and his name change to Israel is found in the opening of biblical lore, Genesis–the book of beginnings. The focus here on this devious character is spurred by a recent television series called Ancient Aliens, which speculated that various unknowns in Earth’s ancient past hinge upon the aspect that extraterrestrials were responsible for those unknowns. This evaluation of the program’s biblical interpretations does not necessarily rule out that such visitations may have occurred. Like hard-line religionists, however, this theory overlooks or deliberately ignores many of the various clues that the priest-authors used to season the tale—clues that were drawn from prehistory lessons that once used groups of stars (constellations) to illustrate Creation principles of energy progression into visible forms. For example, Jacob’s grandfather also had his name changed from Abram to Abraham–and for the same reason, which is also not effectively explained. Jacob’s ladder is regarded as a religious “mystery,” which is referred to as the scala coeli (stairway). This “mystery” is no genuine mystery at all when one follows all the clues that are dropped throughout the story. In the book The Celestial Scripures (by this author), it is pointed out that symbols are employed which are easily recognized by initiates. Jacob is said to have gone out from Beer-sheba (Genesis 28:10), his course being toward Haran. The Beer part of the name means “well,” and the word sheba means “seven”, which indicates that the Life Principle advances through seven stages (symbolized as wells) of primordial development toward visible amassment, and the earliest phenomenon of this activity is seen as light. Thus we read that Jacob “…lighted upon a certain place and he tarried there all night (through that primordial energy plane) because the Sun was set…” (Genesis 28:11). In other words, energy is in the process of manifesting toward denser form–or definable matter form is “set“. At this point Jacob then had to take “…of the stones of that place…” and use them for his pillow. Now this is strange: Jacob is characterized as being a forward planning individual, so wouldn’t such a person have taken with him something to sleep upon during an overnight journey?The prophesy of Ezekiel was explained in the Talmud by Jewish sages that received the explanation from Ezekiel’s own students. The Jews in the times of the Mishna and Talmud where only a few generations after Ezekiel lived. There are many many books of Jewish thought and mysticism based on the visions of Ezekiel and none of them have any mention of Aliens. That prophecy is described as “The workings of the chariot” in Jewish literature. The Workings of the chariot are teachings that were originally only taught in parables, and only to the highest ranking scholars. The vision of the chariot is an elusion to very lofty esoteric concepts. Nobody in his time period believed he was speaking of aliens, or even actual physical beings of any sort. To clarify, this was a prophesy (one of 26 in the book of Ezekiel), which by definition is not a record of an event. No explanation is forthcoming for this lack of preparedness. Instead, he must lay his head upon a pile of stones, and then he has his famous mystifying dream of angel activity on a ladder that linked Heaven with Earth. (Genesis 28:12-17). To repeat, the Genesis story relates that the ladder was seen by Jacob in a dream, not as some actual physical encounter. The ladder that Jacob allegedly beheld, upon which angels or divine messengers were moving up and down, is coded reference to elementary particles that are becoming actively involved in the coalescing phase into biological life; thus it is the ladder-like DNA sequence that is referred to as the ladder which connects all life with the Source. It is at this point in the story that Jacob was then allegedly promised by God (the Life Principle personified) that he and his multitudes of descendants would be given possession of Canaan: but this “land” is not in regard to any Near East area on planet Earth, but symbolizes the advanced energy involvement as matter. This holy account is therefore not history of a specific “chosen” people, but is about how all life forms move through elemental energy phases into temporary matter form where self-aware consciousness is achieved. Nonetheless, this is all implied by the priest-authors to have occurred around the timeframe of 1760 BCE.

When Jacob awakened from this “dream,” he is quoted as saying, “How dreadful is this place!–this is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” (28:17). Huh? “This place” therefore refers to the pre-physical energy conditions or prototype circumstances which initiate matter manifestation. This is “dreadful” only because elementary consciousness is amassing to descend and pass over into visible dense matter identity. It is in this in-between development stage where Jacob “tarried” (it is not until chapter 32 that Jacob is actually transformed into self-aware matter-life as Israel). The stone that Jacob had used for his pillow he then set up as a pillar. Strangely, Jacob had not carried any sleeping gear for the overnight journey, but he had carried along a supply of oil which he poured upon the pillar. And he called that place of intensifying energy Beth-el (House of God).

 

Jacob is said to “tarry” in this prototype situation for fourteen years, and it is here that Rachel and her elder sister Leah enter the story, and both became his wives. Female figures represent energy substance. (So when other scriptural women, some called sisters, marries the lead character they are, being an interacting part of the energy spectrum, not committing incest.) Jacob also frolicked with the female servants of his wives–all with God’s blessing. From these unions Jacob allegedly fathered twelve sons, each to become the ancestors of the twelve tribes of Israel. When at last Jacob and his evolving family stole away from his father-in-law’s locale, they also left with stolen rudiments from the father-in-law before they passed over the river toward the mount Gilead (Genesis 31:21).

 

Later on (Genesis 32:28 and 35:10) Jacob is described as having to indulge in a wrestling match with an angel (some interpret it as a struggle with God). This peculiar wrestling match is said to have lasted “…until the breaking of day,” meaning until energy-form was becoming defined. In the brief description of the wrestling match it is impossible to follow which one of the combatants is Jacob and which one is the “man” during the combat. The reason for this seemingly garbled account is that both participants represent the same energy involvement which is in the process of transforming–or passing over–from primal energy conditions into defined form–or “until the breaking of the day.” When Jacob later asks the name of his opponent, Jacob is rebuffed. The question is never answered, but nonetheless “…he blessed him there.” Who blessed whom? The wrestling match is a parable for energy transformation, so the Life Principle blesses itself by the exertion of transformation! Thus the creative principle has advanced into defined matter form and so we read, “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and has prevailed.” Jacob then named the place of combat as Peniel, which is said to mean, “I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.” Then in 32:31 it relates, “And as he (Jacob) passed over Peniel the sun rose upon him, and he halted upon his thigh”–upon his organ of generation.

So the teasing suggestion in the television series Ancient Aliens that perhaps the ladder in the Jacob fable represents extraterrestrials coming to Earth is another misinterpretation of prehistory lessons concerning the energies of Creation. But in various illustrations which show a ladder descending from a darkish oval area,* that does not signify a UFO; it represents the tunnel mouth out of primordial energy conditions from which energy as visible matter-forms descend. On the other hand the relationship with space and heavenly activity is not exactly alien to scriptures: each of the twelve sons of Jacob/Israel represents one of the signs from the Zodiac. In this dream, Jacob saw a ladder (or in some translations, a stairway) that connected heaven to earth. Additionally, Jacob is said to have seen God at the top of the ladder, and also angels, who were ascending and descending this structure. The story of Jacob’s Ladder may be found in the Book of Genesis.Jacob's Ladder (Hebrew: Sulam Yaakov סולם יעקב) is the colloquial name for a connection between the earth and heaven that the biblical Patriarch Jacob dreams about during his flight from his brother Esau, as described in the Book of Genesis. The significance of the dream has been somewhat debated, but most interpretations agree that it identified Jacob with the obligations and inheritance of the ethnic people chosen by God, as understood in Abrahamic religions. It has since been used as a symbolic reference in various other contexts.Jacob (Arabic: يَعْقُوب‎, translit. Yaʿqūb) is revered in Islam as a prophet and patriarch. Muslim scholars, especially of the perennialist tradition,drew a parallel with Jacob's vision of the ladder[11] and Muhammad's event of the Mi'raj.The ladder of Jacob was interpreted by Muslims to be one of the many symbols of God, and many saw Jacob's ladder as representing in its form the essence of Islam, which emphasizes following the "straight path". The twentieth-century scholar Martin Lings described the significance of the ladder in the Islamic mystic perspective: The ladder of the created Universe is the ladder which appeared in a dream to Jacob, who saw it stretching from Heaven to earth, with Angels going up and down upon it; and it is also the "straight path", for indeed the way of religion is none other than the way of creation itself retraced from its end back to its Beginning.esus said in John 1:51 "And he saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man." This statement has been interpreted as associating or implicating Jesus with the mythical ladder, in that Christ bridges the gap between Heaven and Earth. Jesus presents himself as the reality to which the ladder points; as Jacob saw in a dream the reunion of Heaven and Earth, Jesus brought this reunion, metaphorically the ladder, into reality. Adam Clarke, an early 19th-century Methodist theologian and Bible scholar, elaborates: That by the angels of God ascending and descending, is to be understood, that a perpetual intercourse should now be opened between heaven and earth, through the medium of Christ, who was God manifested in the flesh. Our blessed Lord is represented in his mediatorial capacity as the ambassador of God to men; and the angels ascending and descending upon the Son of Man, is a metaphor taken from the custom of dispatching couriers or messengers from the prince to his ambassador in a foreign court, and from the ambassador back to the prince. The theme of a ladder to heaven is often used by the Church Fathers. Irenaeus in the second century describes the Christian Church as the "ladder of ascent to God".In the third century, Origen explains that there are two ladders in the life of a Christian, the ascetic ladder that the soul climbs on the earth, by way of—and resulting in—an increase in virtue, and the soul's travel after death, climbing up the heavens towards the light of God. In the fourth century, Gregory of Nazianzus[8] speaks of ascending Jacob's Ladder by successive steps towards excellence, interpreting the ladder as an ascetic path, while Saint Gregory of Nyssa narrates, that Moses climbed on Jacob's Ladder to reach the heavens where he entered the tabernacle not made with hands, thus giving the Ladder a clear mystical meaning. The ascetic interpretation is found also in Saint John Chrysostom, who writes: "And so mounting as it were by steps, let us get to heaven by a Jacob’s ladder. For the ladder seems to me to signify in a riddle by that vision the gradual ascent by means of virtue, by which it is possible for us to ascend from earth to heaven, not using material steps, but improvement and correction of manners." Jacob's Ladder as an analogy for the spiritual ascetic of life enjoyed wide influence thanks to the classical work The Ladder of Divine Ascent by John Climacus.he classic Torah commentaries offer several interpretations of Jacob's ladder. According to the Midrash Genesis Rabbah, the ladder signified the exiles which the Jewish people would suffer before the coming of the Messiah. First the angel representing the 70-year exile of Babylonia climbed "up" 70 rungs, and then fell "down". Then the angel representing the exile of Persia went up a number of steps, and fell, as did the angel representing the exile of Greece. Only the fourth angel, which represented the final exile of Rome/Edom (whose guardian angel was Esau himself), kept climbing higher and higher into the clouds. Jacob feared that his children would never be free of Esau's domination, but God assured him that at the End of Days, Edom too would come falling down. Another interpretation of the ladder keys into the fact that the angels first "ascended" and then "descended". The Midrash explains that Jacob, as a holy man, was always accompanied by angels. When he reached the border of the land of Canaan (the future land of Israel), the angels who were assigned to the Holy Land went back up to Heaven and the angels assigned to other lands came down to meet Jacob. When Jacob returned to Canaan he was greeted by the angels who were assigned to the Holy Land. Yet another interpretation is this: The place at which Jacob stopped for the night was in reality Mount Moriah, the future home of the Temple in Jerusalem. The ladder therefore signifies the "bridge" between Heaven and earth, as prayers and sacrifices offered in the Holy Temple soldered a connection between God and the Jewish people. Moreover, the ladder alludes to the giving of the Torah as another connection between heaven and earth. In this interpretation, it is also significant that the Hebrew word for ladder, sulam (סלם) and the name for the mountain on which the Torah was given, Sinai (סיני) have the same gematria (numerical value of the letters). The Hellenistic Jewish philosopher Philo, born in Alexandria, (d. ca. 50 CE) presents his allegorical interpretation of the ladder in the first book of his De somniis. There he gives four interpretations, which are not mutually exclusive: The angels represent souls descending to and ascending from bodies (some consider this to be Philo's clearest reference to the doctrine of reincarnation). In the second interpretation the ladder is the human soul and the angels are God's logoi, pulling the soul up in distress and descending in compassion. In the third view the dream depicts the ups and downs of the life of the "practiser" (of virtue vs. sin). Finally the angels represent the continually changing affairs of men. A hilltop overlooking the Israeli settlement of Beit El north of Jerusalem that is believed by some to be the site of Jacob's dream is a tourist destination during the holiday of Sukkot.Is it the case that Ezekiel saw an alien-operated flying machine from outer space? No, Ezekiel did not see an alien spaceship. How, then, are his visions to be explained? When one looks into Ezekiel’s prophetic book, it becomes clear that Ezekiel did see some strange things. From a quick reading of chapter one, it becomes apparent that Ezekiel saw a “great cloud with raging fire engulfing itself ” (vs. 4), four living creatures from within the cloud (vs. 5), a wheel beside each living creature (vs. 15), and the rims of the wheels full of eyes (vs. 18), among many other things. Indeed, the things seen by Ezekiel were amazing and unusual to say the least.

But with a little research into the biblical message, it becomes clear that Ezekiel’s writing and visions were apocalyptic in nature—very similar to the writings found in both Daniel and Revelation. The visions Ezekiel described are of heavenly, spiritual beings, not “alien life forms.” By comparing the description of the living creatures in Ezekiel to that of the living creatures that surround the throne of God in Revelation 4, one quickly realizes that the scenes witnessed by Ezekiel, John, Daniel, and other inspired writers were visions of God and His spiritual host of heaven. As further evidence of this fact, at the end of Ezekiel 1, after describing “a likeness with the appearance of a man” on a throne, Ezekiel wrote: “This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord” (1:28). Then, a few verses later in chapter 2, this same person said to Ezekiel, “Son of man, I am sending you to the children of Israel, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me” (2:3). Ezekiel fully understood this to be the Lord talking to Him, that the vision was of spiritual beings, and that he had not had an encounter

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob%27s_Ladder

  

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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The Chesapeake Bay Program's photographic archive is available for media and non-commercial use at no charge. To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

A photo credit mentioning the Chesapeake Bay Program is mandatory. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way or used in any way that suggests approval or endorsement of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Requestors should also respect the publicity rights of individuals photographed, and seek their consent if necessary.

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: Scott Andrews, Canon

 

Original image:

mediaarchive.ksc.nasa.gov/detail.cfm?mediaid=43940

 

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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The Chesapeake Bay Program's photographic archive is available for media and non-commercial use at no charge.

 

To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

A photo credit mentioning the Chesapeake Bay Program is mandatory. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way or used in any way that suggests approval or endorsement of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Requestors should also respect the publicity rights of individuals photographed, and seek their consent if necessary.

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!

At Launch Pad 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, xenon lights illuminate the Constellation Program's 327-foot-tall Ares I-X rocket after the rotating service structure, has been retracted from around it for launch. The transfer of the pad from the Space Shuttle Program to the Constellation Program took place May 31. Modifications made to the pad include the removal of shuttle unique subsystems, such as the orbiter access arm and a section of the gaseous oxygen vent arm, and the installation of three 600-foot lightning towers, access platforms, environmental control systems and a vehicle stabilization system. 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. The Ares I-X flight test is targeted for Oct. 27.

 

Image credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett

 

Original image:

mediaarchive.ksc.nasa.gov/detail.cfm?mediaid=43913

 

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 Space Shuttle prototype Enterprise flies free after being released from NASA's 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA) over Rogers Dry Lakebed during the second of five free flights carried out at the Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California, as part of the Shuttle program's Approach and Landing Tests (ALT).

 

The tests were conducted to verify orbiter aerodynamics and handling characteristics in preparation for orbital flights with the Space Shuttle Columbia beginning in April 1981. A tail cone over the main engine area of Enterprise smoothed out turbulent air flow during flight. It was removed on the two last free flights to accurately check approach and landing characteristics. A series of test flights during which Enterprise was taken aloft atop the SCA, but was not released, preceded the free flight tests. The Space Shuttle Approach and Landing Tests (ALT) program allowed pilots and engineers to learn how the Space Shuttle and the modified Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA) handled during low-speed flight and landing. The Enterprise, a prototype of the Space Shuttles, and the SCA were flown to conduct the approach and landing tests at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California, from February to October 1977. The first flight of the program consisted of the Space Shuttle Enterprise attached to the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.

 

These flights were to determine how well the two vehicles flew together. Five "captive-inactive" flights were flown during this first phase in which there was no crew in the Enterprise. The next series of captive flights was flown with a flight crew of two on board the prototype Space Shuttle. Only three such flights proved necessary. This led to the free-flight test series. The free-flight phase of the ALT program allowed pilots and engineers to learn how the Space Shuttle handled in low-speed flight and landing attitudes. For these landings, the Enterprise was flown by a crew of two after it was released from the top of the SCA. The vehicle was released at altitudes ranging from 19,000 to 26,000 feet.

 

The Enterprise had no propulsion system, but its first four glides to the Rogers Dry Lake runway provided realistic, in-flight simulations of how subsequent Space Shuttles would be flown at the end of an orbital mission. The fifth approach and landing test, with the Enterprise landing on the Edwards Air Force Base concrete runway, revealed a problem with the Space Shuttle flight control system that made it susceptible to Pilot-Induced Oscillation (PIO), a potentially dangerous control problem during a landing. Further research using other NASA aircraft, especially the F-8 Digital-Fly-By-Wire aircraft, led to correction of the PIO problem before the first orbital flight. The Enterprise's last free-flight was October 26, 1977, after which it was ferried to other NASA centers for ground-based flight simulations that tested Space Shuttle systems and structure.

  

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Visit the Review of Human Space Flight Committee Web Site

Two F-35s completed the program's first East-bound trans-Atlantic crossing on May 23, 2016. The jets, the first two for the Netherlands, known as AN-1 and AN-2, departed NAS Patuxent River, Maryland, and were greeted by an eager crowd at Leeuwarden Air Base in the Netherlands. Photo credit: Frank Crebas. Learn more: bit.ly/27QRvdp

A dark pattern is "a user interface that has been carefully crafted to trick users into doing things, such as buying insurance with their purchase or signing up for recurring bills." The neologism dark pattern was coined by Harry Brignull on July 28, 2010 with the registration of darkpatterns.org, a "pattern library with the specific goal of naming and shaming deceptive user interfaces.Bait-and-switch patterns advertise a free (or greatly reduced) product or service which is wholly unavailable or stocked in small quantities. After it is apparent the product is no longer available, they are exposed to other priced products similar to the one advertised. This is common in software installers, where a button will be presented in the fashion of a typical continuation button. It is common that one has to accept the program's terms of service, so a dark pattern would show a prominent "I accept these terms" button on a page where the user is asked to accept the terms of a program unrelated to the program they are trying to install. Since the user will typically accept the terms by force of habit, the unrelated program can subsequently be installed. The installer's authors do this because they are paid by the authors of the unrelated program for each install that they procure. The alternative route in the installer, allowing the user to skip installing the unrelated program, is much less prominently displayed or seems counter-intuitive (such as declining the terms of service).

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_pattern

 

This pattern is also used by some websites, where the user is shown a page where information is asked that is not required. For example, one would fill out a username and password on one page, and after clicking the "next" button the user is asked for their email address with another "next" button as the only option. It is not apparent that the step can be skipped. When simply pressing "next" without entering their personal information, however, the website will just continue. In some cases, a method to skip the step is visible but not shown as a button (instead, usually, as a small and greyed-out link) so that it does not stand out to the user. Other examples that often use this pattern are inviting friends by entering someone else's email address, uploading a profile picture, or selecting interests.

 

”This is a civilizational moment in a way I’m not sure we’re all reckoning with,” Harris said on stage. “It’s a historical moment when a species that is intelligent builds technology that ... can simulate a puppet version of its creator, and the puppet can control the master. That’s an unprecedented situation to be in. That could be the end of human agency, when you can perfectly simulate not just the strengths of people but their weaknesses.”

 

Where does technology exploit our minds weaknesses?

 

I learned to think this way when I was a magician. Magicians start by looking for blind spots, edges, vulnerabilities and limits of people’s perception, so they can influence what people do without them even realizing it. Once you know how to push people’s buttons, you can play them like a piano.

  

That’s me performing sleight of hand magic at my mother’s birthday party

And this is exactly what product designers do to your mind. They play your psychological vulnerabilities (consciously and unconsciously) against you in the race to grab your attention.

 

I want to show you how they do it.

 

Hijack #1: If You Control the Menu, You Control the Choices

 

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Western Culture is built around ideals of individual choice and freedom. Millions of us fiercely defend our right to make “free” choices, while we ignore how we’re manipulated upstream by limited menus we didn’t choose.

 

This is exactly what magicians do. They give people the illusion of free choice while architecting the menu so that they win, no matter what you choose. I can’t emphasize how deep this insight is.

 

When people are given a menu of choices, they rarely ask:

 

“what’s not on the menu?”

“why am I being given these options and not others?”

“do I know the menu provider’s goals?”

“is this menu empowering for my original need, or are the choices actually a distraction?” (e.g. an overwhelmingly array of toothpastes)

Photo by Kevin McShane

 

How empowering is this menu of choices for the need, “I ran out of toothpaste”?

For example, imagine you’re out with friends on a Tuesday night and want to keep the conversation going. You open Yelp to find nearby recommendations and see a list of bars. The group turns into a huddle of faces staring down at their phones comparing bars. They scrutinize the photos of each, comparing cocktail drinks. Is this menu still relevant to the original desire of the group?

 

It’s not that bars aren’t a good choice, it’s that Yelp substituted the group’s original question (“where can we go to keep talking?”) with a different question (“what’s a bar with good photos of cocktails?”) all by shaping the menu.

 

Moreover, the group falls for the illusion that Yelp’s menu represents acomplete set of choices for where to go. While looking down at their phones, they don’t see the park across the street with a band playing live music. They miss the pop-up gallery on the other side of the street serving crepes and coffee. Neither of those show up on Yelp’s menu.

 

Yelp subtly reframes the group’s need “where can we go to keep talking?” in terms of photos of cocktails served.

The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from. Is it?

 

The “most empowering” menu is different than the menu that has the most choices. But when we blindly surrender to the menus we’re given, it’s easy to lose track of the difference:

 

“Who’s free tonight to hang out?” becomes a menu of most recent people who texted us (who we could ping).

“What’s happening in the world?” becomes a menu of news feed stories.

“Who’s single to go on a date?” becomes a menu of faces to swipe on Tinder (instead of local events with friends, or urban adventures nearby).

“I have to respond to this email.” becomes a menu of keys to type a response (instead of empowering ways to communicate with a person).

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All user interfaces are menus. What if your email client gave you empowering choices of ways to respond, instead of “what message do you want to type back?” (Design by Tristan Harris)

When we wake up in the morning and turn our phone over to see a list of notifications — it frames the experience of “waking up in the morning” around a menu of “all the things I’ve missed since yesterday.”

  

A list of notifications when we wake up in the morning — how empowering is this menu of choices when we wake up? Does it reflect what we care about? (credit to Joe Edelman)

By shaping the menus we pick from, technology hijacks the way we perceive our choices and replaces them new ones. But the closer we pay attention to the options we’re given, the more we’ll notice when they don’t actually align with our true needs.

 

Hijack #2: Put a Slot Machine In a Billion Pockets

 

If you’re an app, how do you keep people hooked? Turn yourself into a slot machine.

 

The average person checks their phone 150 times a day. Why do we do this? Are we making 150 conscious choices?

  

How often do you check your email per day?

One major reason why is the #1 psychological ingredient in slot machines:intermittent variable rewards.

 

If you want to maximize addictiveness, all tech designers need to do is link a user’s action (like pulling a lever) with a variable reward. You pull a lever and immediately receive either an enticing reward (a match, a prize!) or nothing. Addictiveness is maximized when the rate of reward is most variable.

 

Does this effect really work on people? Yes. Slot machines make more money in the United States than baseball, movies, and theme parkscombined. Relative to other kinds of gambling, people get ‘problematically involved’ with slot machines 3–4x faster according to NYU professor Natasha Dow Shull, author of Addiction by Design.

 

But here’s the unfortunate truth — several billion people have a slot machine their pocket:

 

When we pull our phone out of our pocket, we’re playing a slot machineto see what notifications we got.

When we pull to refresh our email, we’re playing a slot machine to see what new email we got.

When we swipe down our finger to scroll the Instagram feed, we’replaying a slot machine to see what photo comes next.

When we swipe faces left/right on dating apps like Tinder, we’re playing a slot machine to see if we got a match.

When we tap the # of red notifications, we’re playing a slot machine to what’s underneath.

 

Apps and websites sprinkle intermittent variable rewards all over their products because it’s good for business.

 

But in other cases, slot machines emerge by accident. For example, there is no malicious corporation behind all of email who consciously chose to make it a slot machine. No one profits when millions check their email and nothing’s there. Neither did Apple and Google’s designers want phones to work like slot machines. It emerged by accident.

 

But now companies like Apple and Google have a responsibility to reduce these effects by converting intermittent variable rewards into less addictive, more predictable ones with better design. For example, they could empower people to set predictable times during the day or week for when they want to check “slot machine” apps, and correspondingly adjust when new messages are delivered to align with those times.

 

Hijack #3: Fear of Missing Something Important (FOMSI)

 

Another way apps and websites hijack people’s minds is by inducing a “1% chance you could be missing something important.”

 

If I convince you that I’m a channel for important information, messages, friendships, or potential sexual opportunities — it will be hard for you to turn me off, unsubscribe, or remove your account — because (aha, I win) you might miss something important:

 

This keeps us subscribed to newsletters even after they haven’t delivered recent benefits (“what if I miss a future announcement?”)

This keeps us “friended” to people with whom we haven’t spoke in ages (“what if I miss something important from them?”)

This keeps us swiping faces on dating apps, even when we haven’t even met up with anyone in a while (“what if I miss that one hot match who likes me?”)

This keeps us using social media (“what if I miss that important news story or fall behind what my friends are talking about?”)

But if we zoom into that fear, we’ll discover that it’s unbounded: we’ll always miss something important at any point when we stop using something.

 

There are magic moments on Facebook we’ll miss by not using it for the 6th hour (e.g. an old friend who’s visiting town right now).

There are magic moments we’ll miss on Tinder (e.g. our dream romantic partner) by not swiping our 700th match.

There are emergency phone calls we’ll miss if we’re not connected 24/7.

But living moment to moment with the fear of missing something isn’t how we’re built to live.

 

And it’s amazing how quickly, once we let go of that fear, we wake up from the illusion. When we unplug for more than a day, unsubscribe from those notifications, or go to Camp Grounded — the concerns we thought we’d have don’t actually happen.

 

We don’t miss what we don’t see.

 

The thought, “what if I miss something important?” is generated in advance of unplugging, unsubscribing, or turning off — not after. Imagine if tech companies recognized that, and helped us proactively tune our relationships with friends and businesses in terms of what we define as “time well spent” for our lives, instead of in terms of what we might miss.

 

Hijack #4: Social Approval

  

Easily one of the most persuasive things a human being can receive.

We’re all vulnerable to social approval. The need to belong, to be approved or appreciated by our peers is among the highest human motivations. But now our social approval is in the hands of tech companies (like when we’re tagged in a photo).

 

When I get tagged by my friend Marc (above), I imagine him making aconscious choice to tag me. But I don’t see how a company like Facebook orchestrated him doing that in the first place.

 

Facebook, Instagram or SnapChat can manipulate how often people get tagged in photos by automatically suggesting all the faces people should tag (e.g. by showing a box with a 1-click confirmation, “Tag Tristan in this photo?”).

 

So when Marc tags me, he’s actually responding to Facebook’s suggestion, not making an independent choice. But through design choices like this,Facebook controls the multiplier for how often millions of people experience their social approval on the line.

  

Facebook uses automatic suggestions like this to get people to tag more people, creating more social externalities and interruptions.

The same happens when we change our main profile photo — Facebook knows that’s a moment when we’re vulnerable to social approval: “what do my friends think of my new pic?” Facebook can rank this higher in the news feed, so it sticks around for longer and more friends will like or comment on it. Each time they like or comment on it, I’ll get pulled right back.

 

Everyone innately responds to social approval, but some demographics (teenagers) are more vulnerable to it than others. That’s why it’s so important to recognize how powerful designers are when they exploit this vulnerability.

  

Hijack #5: Social Reciprocity (Tit-for-tat)

 

You do me a favor, now I owe you one next time.

You say, “thank you”— I have to say “you’re welcome.”

You send me an email— it’s rude not to get back to you.

You follow me — it’s rude not to follow you back. (especially for teenagers)

We are vulnerable to needing to reciprocate others’ gestures. But as with Social Approval, tech companies now manipulate how often we experience it.

 

In some cases, it’s by accident. Email, texting and messaging apps are social reciprocity factories. But in other cases, companies exploit this vulnerability on purpose.

 

LinkedIn is the most obvious offender. LinkedIn wants as many people creating social obligations for each other as possible, because each time they reciprocate (by accepting a connection, responding to a message, or endorsing someone back for a skill) they have to come back through linkedin.com where they can get people to spend more time.

 

Like Facebook, LinkedIn exploits an asymmetry in perception. When you receive an invitation from someone to connect, you imagine that person making a conscious choice to invite you, when in reality, they likely unconsciously responded to LinkedIn’s list of suggested contacts. In other words, LinkedIn turns your unconscious impulses (to “add” a person) into new social obligations that millions of people feel obligated to repay. All while they profit from the time people spend doing it.

  

Imagine millions of people getting interrupted like this throughout their day, running around like chickens with their heads cut off, reciprocating each other — all designed by companies who profit from it.

 

Welcome to social media.

  

After accepting an endorsement, LinkedIn takes advantage of your bias to reciprocate by offering *four* additional people for you to endorse in return.

Imagine if technology companies had a responsibility to minimize social reciprocity. Or if there was an “FDA for Tech” that monitored when technology companies abused these biases?

  

Hijack #6: Bottomless bowls, Infinite Feeds, and Autoplay

  

YouTube autoplays the next video after a countdown

Another way to hijack people is to keep them consuming things, even when they aren’t hungry anymore.

 

How? Easy. Take an experience that was bounded and finite, and turn it into a bottomless flow that keeps going.

 

Cornell professor Brian Wansink demonstrated this in his study showing you can trick people into keep eating soup by giving them a bottomless bowl that automatically refills as they eat. With bottomless bowls, people eat 73% more calories than those with normal bowls and underestimate how many calories they ate by 140 calories.

 

Tech companies exploit the same principle. News feeds are purposely designed to auto-refill with reasons to keep you scrolling, and purposely eliminate any reason for you to pause, reconsider or leave.

 

It’s also why video and social media sites like Netflix, YouTube or Facebookautoplay the next video after a countdown instead of waiting for you to make a conscious choice (in case you won’t). A huge portion of traffic on these websites is driven by autoplaying the next thing.

  

Facebook autoplays the next video after a countdown

Tech companies often claim that “we’re just making it easier for users to see the video they want to watch” when they are actually serving their business interests. And you can’t blame them, because increasing “time spent” is the currency they compete for.

 

Instead, imagine if technology companies empowered you to consciously bound your experience to align with what would be “time well spent” for you. Not just bounding the quantity of time you spend, but the qualities of what would be “time well spent.”

 

Hijack #7: Instant Interruption vs. “Respectful” Delivery

 

Companies know that messages that interrupt people immediately are more persuasive at getting people to respond than messages delivered asynchronously (like email or any deferred inbox).

 

Given the choice, Facebook Messenger (or WhatsApp, WeChat or SnapChat for that matter) would prefer to design their messaging system to interrupt recipients immediately (and show a chat box) instead of helping users respect each other’s attention.

 

In other words, interruption is good for business.

 

It’s also in their interest to heighten the feeling of urgency and social reciprocity. For example, Facebook automatically tells the sender when you “saw” their message, instead of letting you avoid disclosing whether you read it(“now that you know I’ve seen the message, I feel even more obligated to respond.”) By contrast, Apple more respectfully lets users toggle “Read Receipts” on or off.

 

The problem is, while messaging apps maximize interruptions in the name of business, it creates a tragedy of the commons that ruins global attention spans and causes billions of interruptions every day. This is a huge problem we need to fix with shared design standards (potentially, as part of Time Well Spent).

 

Hijack #8: Bundling Your Reasons with Their Reasons

 

Another way apps hijack you is by taking your reasons for visiting the app (to perform a task) and make them inseparable from the app’s business reasons(maximizing how much we consume once we’re there).

 

For example, in the physical world of grocery stories, the #1 and #2 most popular reasons to visit are pharmacy refills and buying milk. But grocery stores want to maximize how much people buy, so they put the pharmacy and the milk at the back of the store.

 

In other words, they make the thing customers want (milk, pharmacy) inseparable from what the business wants. If stores were truly organized to support people, they would put the most popular items in the front.

 

Tech companies design their websites the same way. For example, when you you want to look up a Facebook event happening tonight (your reason) the Facebook app doesn’t allow you to access it without first landing on the news feed (their reasons), and that’s on purpose. Facebook wants to convert every reason you have for using Facebook, into their reason which is to maximize the time you spend consuming things.

 

In an ideal world, apps would always give you a direct way to get what you want separately from what they want.

 

Imagine a digital “bill of rights” outlining design standards that forced the products that billions of people used to support empowering ways to navigate towards their goals.

 

Hijack #9: Inconvenient Choices

 

We’re told that it’s enough for businesses to “make choices available.”

 

“If you don’t like it you can always use a different product.”

“If you don’t like it, you can always unsubscribe.”

“If you’re addicted to our app, you can always uninstall it from your phone.”

Businesses naturally want to make the choices they want you to make easier, and the choices they don’t want you to make harder. Magicians do the same thing. You make it easier for a spectator to pick the thing you want them to pick, and harder to pick the thing you don’t.

 

For example, NYTimes.com let’s you “make a free choice” to cancel your digital subscription. But instead of just doing it when you hit “Cancel Subscription,” they force you to call a phone number that’s only open at certain times.

  

NYTimes claims it’s giving a free choice to cancel your account

Instead of viewing the world in terms of choice availability of choices, we should view the world in terms of friction required to enact choices.

 

Imagine a world where choices were labeled with how difficult they were to fulfill (like coefficients of friction) and there was an FDA for Tech that labeled these difficulties and set standards for how easy navigation should be.

 

Hijack #10: Forecasting Errors, “Foot in the Door” strategies

  

Facebook promises an easy choice to “See Photo.” Would we still click if it gave the true price tag?

People don’t intuitively forecast the true cost of a click when it’s presented to them. Sales people use “foot in the door” techniques by asking for a small innocuous request to begin with (“just one click”), and escalating from there (“why don’t you stay awhile?”). Virtually all engagement websites use this trick.

 

Imagine if web browsers and smartphones, the gateways through which people make these choices, were truly watching out for people and helped them forecast the consequences of clicks (based on real data about what it actually costs most people?).

 

That’s why I add “Estimated reading time” to the top of my posts. When you put the “true cost” of a choice in front of people, you’re treating your users or audience with dignity and respect.

 

In a Time Well Spent internet, choices would be framed in terms of projected cost and benefit, so people were empowered to make informed choices.

  

TripAdvisor uses a “foot in the door” technique by asking for a single click review (“How many stars?”) while hiding the three page form behind the click.

Summary And How We Can Fix This

 

Are you upset that technology is hijacking your agency? I am too. I’ve listed a few techniques but there are literally thousands. Imagine whole bookshelves, seminars, workshops and trainings that teach aspiring tech entrepreneurs techniques like this. They exist.

 

The ultimate freedom is a free mind, and we need technology to be on our team to help us live, feel, think and act freely.

 

We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first. People’s time is valuable. And we should protect it with the same rigor as privacy and other digital rights.

 

Tristan Harris was Product Philosopher at Google until 2016 where he studied how technology affects a billion people’s attention, wellbeing and behavior.

 

For more information and get involved, check out timewellspent.io. This piece is cross-posted on Medium.

  

MARCH 7, 2016 by TRISTAN HARRIS

Tech Companies Design Your Life, Here’s Why You Should Care

 

UNCATEGORIZED

5 COMMENTS

 

Four years ago, I sold my company to Google and joined the ranks there. I spent my last three years there as Product Philosopher, looking at the profound ways the design of screens shape billions of human lives – and asking what it means for them to do so ethically and responsibly.

 

What I came away with is that something’s not right with how our screens are designed, and I’m writing this to help you understand why you should care, and what you can do about it.

 

I shouldn’t have to cite statistics about the central role screens play in our lives. Billions of us turn to smartphones every day. We wake up with them. We fall asleep with them. You’re looking at one right now.

 

Of course, new technologies always reshape society, and it’s always tempting to worry about them solely for this reason. Socrates worried that the technology of writing would “create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls, because they [would] not use their memories.” We worried that newspapers would make people stop talking to each other on the subway. We worried that we would use television to “amuse ourselves to death.”

 

hFKu8yj

 

“And see!” people say. “Nothing bad happened!” Isn’t humanity more prosperous, more technically sophisticated, and better connected than ever? Is it really that big of a problem that people spend so much time staring at their smartphones? Isn’t it just another cultural shift, like all the others? Won’t we just adapt?

 

Invisibility of the New Normal

 

I don’t think so. What’s missing from this perspective is that all these technologies (books, television, radio, newspapers) did change everything about society, we just don’t see it. They replaced our old menus of choices with new ones. Each new menu eventually became the new normal – “the way things are” – and, after our memories of old menus had faded into the past, the new menus became “the way things have always been.”

 

gold-fish-in-waterASK A FISH ABOUT WATER AND THEY’LL RESPOND, “WHAT’S WATER?”

Consider that the average American now watches more than 5.5 hours of television per day. Regardless of whether you think TV is good or bad, hundreds of millions of people spend 30% of their waking hours watching it. It’s hard to overstate the vast consequences of this shift– for the blood flows of millions of people, for our understanding of reality, for the relational habits of families, for the strategies and outcomes of political campaigns. Yet for those who live with them day-to-day, they are invisible.

 

So what best describes the nature of what smart phones are “doing” to us?

 

A New “Perfect” Choice on Life’s Menu

 

If I had to summarize it, it’s this: Our phone puts a new choice on life’s menu, in any moment, that’s “sweeter” than reality.

 

If, at any moment, reality gets dull or boring, our phone offers something more pleasurable, more productive and even more educational than whatever reality gives us.

 

And this new choice fits into any moment. Our phone offers 5-second choices like “checking email” that feel better than waiting in line. And it offers 30-minute choices like a podcast that will teach you that thing you’ve been dying to learn, which feels better than a 30-minute walk in silence.

 

Once you see your phone this way, wouldn’t you turn to it more often? It always happens this way: when new things fill our needs better than the old, we switch:

 

When cheaper, faster to prepare food appears, we switch: Packaged foods.

When more accurate search engines appear, we switch: Google.

When cheaper, faster forms of transportation appear, we switch: Uber.

756612-b6f6919a-555a-11e3-b451-c2835887c2f5

 

So it goes with phones.

 

But it also changes us on the inside. We grow less and less patient for reality as it is, especially when it’s boring or uncomfortable. We come to expect more from the world, more rapidly. And because reality can’t live up to our expectations, it reinforces how often we want to turn to our screens. A self-reinforcing feedback loop.

 

And because of the attention economy, every product will only get more persuasive over time. Facebook must become more persuasive if it wants to compete with YouTube and survive. YouTube must become more persuasive if it wants to compete with Facebook. And we’re not just talking about ‘cheap’ amusement (aka cat videos). These products will only get better at giving us choices that make every bone in our body say, “yeah I want that!”

 

So what’s wrong about this? If the entire attention economy is working to fill us up with more perfect-feeling things to spend time on, which outcompete being with the discomfort of ourselves or our surroundings, shouldn’t that be fantastic?

 

wall-e

 

Clearly something is missing from this picture. But what is it?

 

Maybe it’s that “filling people up,” even with incredible choices on screens somehow doesn’t add up to a life well lived. Or that those choices weren’t what we wished we’d been persuaded to do in the bigger sense of our lives.

 

With design as it is today, screens threaten our fundamental agency. Maybe we are “choosing,” but we are choosing from persuasive menus driven by companies who have different goals than ours.

 

And that begs us to ask, “what are our goals?” or how do we want to spend our time? There are as many “good lives” as there are people, but our technology (and the attention economy) don’t really seem on our team to give us the agency to live according to them.

 

A Whole New Persuasive World

 

And it’s about to get a lot worse. Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality will offer whole new immersive realities that are even more persuasive than physical reality.

 

zuck-virtual-reality

 

When you could have sex with the person of your dreams, or fly through jungles in the Amazon rainforest while looking over at your best friend flying next to you, who would want to stick with reality?

 

By the way, this isn’t your usual “look, VR is coming!” prediction. This is the real deal. Facebook recently spent $2 billion to buy Oculus Rift, and hopes to put them in every home for this holiday season. Just like the late 1980’s when suddenly everyone you knew had a Nintendo.

 

Acknowledging the Problem

 

So we have a fundamental misalignment– between what the attention economy is competing to produce (more perfect, persuasive choices that fit into any moment), the design of our phones, and the aspirations people have for their lives (their definition of “the good life”).

 

AttentionEconomyMisalignment

 

So what’s missing from the design of our phones? I like to use the metaphor of ergonomics. When you think of ergonomics, you might think of boring things like how a cup fits into someone’s hand, but it’s way more than that.

 

If regular design is about how we want things to work, ergonomics is concerned with failure modes and extremes: how things break under repetition, stress or other limits. And the goal of ergonomics is to create an alignment between those limits, and the goals people have for how they want to use it.

 

10 Handle diameter

 

For example, an ergonomically designed coffee mug aligns the natural fatigue of forearm muscles during use (as a person “lifts” it to sip) with how frequently people want to use it, so they still can lift it successfully with repetition.

 

What does this have to do with phones?

 

Our minds urgently need a new “ergonomics,” based on the mind’s limited capacities, biases, fatigue curves and the ways it forms habits. The attention economy tears our minds apart. With its onslaught of never-ending choices, never-ending supply of relationships and obligations, the attention economy bulldozes the natural shape of our physical and psychological limits and turns impulses into bad habits.

 

Just like the food industry manipulates our innate biases for salt, sugar and fat with perfectly engineered combinations, the tech industry bulldozes our innate biases for Social Reciprocity (we’re built to get back to others), Social Approval (we’re built to care what others think of us), Social Comparison (how we’re doing with respect to our peers) and Novelty-seeking (we’re built to seek surprises over the predictable).

 

Millions of years of evolution did a great job giving us genes to care about how others perceive us. But Facebook bulldozes those biases, by forcing us to deal with how thousands of people perceive us.

 

This isn’t to say that phones today aren’t designed ergonomically, they are just ergonomic to a narrow scope of goals:

 

for a single user (holding the phone)

for single tasks (opening an app)

for individual choices

And a narrow scope of human physical limits:

 

how far our thumb has to reach to tap an app

how loud the phone must vibrate for our ear to hear it

So what if we expanded the scope of ergonomics for a more holistic set of human goals:

 

a holistic sense of a person

a holistic sense of how they want to spend their time (and goals)

a holistic sense of their relationships (interpersonal & social choices)

an ability to make holistic choices (including opportunity costs & externalities)

an ability to reflect, before and after

…and what if we aligned these goals with a more holistic set of our mental, social and emotional limits?

 

A New Kind of Ergonomics

 

Let’s call this new kind of ergonomics “Holistic Ergonomics”. Holistic Ergonomics recognizes our holistic mental and emotional limits [vulnerabilities, fatigue and ways our minds form habits] and aligns them with the holistic goals we have for our lives (not just the single tasks). Holistic Ergonomics is built to give us back agency in an increasingly persuasive attention economy.

 

Joe Edelman and I have taught design workshops on this, calling it EmpoweringDesign.org, or designing to empower people’s agency.

 

It includes an interpersonal ergonomics, to “align” our social psychological instincts with how and when we want to make ourselves available to others (like in my TED talk), so that we can reclaim agency over how we want to relate to others.

 

Just like an ergonomic coffee mug is safe to live by, even under repetition, over and over again, without causing harm to ourselves or others, in a Time Well Spent world our phones would be designed with Holistic Ergonomics, so that even under repetition, over and over again, our phones do not cause harm to ourselves or others — our phones become safe to live by. They support our Agency.

 

How to Change the Game

 

Android.Apple_.001

 

Right now, two companies are responsible for the primary screens that a billion people live by. Apple and Google make the two dominant smartphone platforms. Facebook and Microsoft make leading Virtual and Augmented Reality platforms, Oculus and Hololens.

 

You might think that it’s against the business models of Apple and Google to facilitate people’s agency, which might include making it easier to spend time off the screen, and use apps less. But it’s not.

 

Apple and Google, like all companies, respond to what consumers demand.

 

When Privacy became important to you, they responded. They developed new privacy and security features, and it sparked a whole new public conversation and debate. It’s now the most popular concern about technology discussed in media.

 

When Organic food became important to you, they responded too. Walmart added it to their stores.

 

We need to do the same thing with this issue. Until now, with this experience of distraction, social media, and this vague sense that we don’t feel good when we use our phones for too long, there’s been nothing to rally behind. It’s too diffuse. We receive so many incredible benefits from tech, but we’ve also been feeling like we’ve been losing ourselves, and our humanity?

 

But we’re naming it now.

 

What’s at stake is our Agency. Our ability to live the lives we want to live, choose the way we want to choose, and relate to others the way we want to relate to them – through technology. This is a design problem, not just a personal responsibility problem.

 

If you want your Agency, you need to tell these companies that that’s what you want from them– not just another shiny new phone that overloads our psychological vulnerabilities. Tell them you want your Agency back, and to help you spend your time the way you want to, and they will respond.

 

I hope this helps spark that bigger conversation.

 

www.tristanharris.com/essays/

© all rights reserved

 

Ph.: Orarossa - Ascoli Piceno, Italy

 

Make: NIKON

Model: D810

Data Time: 10/01/2016 - 14:09

Shutter Speed: 1/250 sec

Exposure Program: S

F-Stop: f/16

ISO Speed Ratings: 80

Focal Length: 85 mm

Flash: OFF

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.

The first internationally-produced F-35 Lightning II took to the skies on Sept. 7, 2015, marking the F-35 program’s first international flight. Learn more: bit.ly/1VM9rPn

‘Crew One,’ a three-man weapons load team, completes the first full external loadout with live munitions for the Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightening II May 3, 2019, at Al Dhafra Air Base, United Arab Emirates. Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning IIs assigned to the 4th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron were configured in a full external live loadout of six GBU-49 small glide munitions and two AIM-9x Sidewinder missiles to execute an operation in Southwest Asia.

  

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.

As aviation enthusiasts from the Royal International Air Tattoo's Park & View area looked on, the F-35B performed the program's first vertical landing in the UK during validation flights for the show on July 6, 2016. bit.ly/294hI2g

Two Lockheed Martin F-35B "Lightning II" fighter jets have successfully landed on board HMS Queen Elizabeth for the first time, laying the foundations for the next 50 years of fixed wing aviation in support of the UK’s Carrier Strike Capability.

 

Royal Navy Commander, Nathan Gray, 41, made history by being the first to land on board HMS Queen Elizabeth, carefully maneuvering his stealth jet onto the thermal coated deck. He was followed by Squadron Leader Andy Edgell, RAF, both of whom are test pilots, operating with the Integrated Test Force (ITF) based at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland.

 

Shortly afterwards, once a deck inspection has been conducted and the all-clear given, Cmdr Gray became the first pilot to take off using the ship’s ski-ramp.

  

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.

  

The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) is a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey that will continue the Landsat Program's 40-year data record of monitoring Earth's landscapes from space. LDCM will expand and improve on that record with observations that advance a wide range of Earth sciences and contribute to the management of agriculture, water and forest resources.

 

The Landsat Program is a series of Earth-observing satellite missions jointly managed by NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey. The first Landsat satellite launched in 1972 and the next satellite in the series, the Landsat Data Continuity Mission – LDCM, is scheduled to launch on February 11, 2013.

 

LDCM will launch from Vandenburg Air Force Base using an Atlas V-401 rocket from ULA.

 

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

 

---

 

Managers have given the "go" to proceed toward a Feb.11 launch of NASA's Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) spacecraft atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

 

The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) is the future of Landsat satellites. It will continue to obtain valuable data and imagery to be used in agriculture, education, business, science, and government.

 

The mission will extend more than 40 years of global land observations that are critical in many areas, such as energy and water management, forest monitoring, human and environmental health, urban planning, disaster recovery and agriculture.

 

To learn more about LDCM and Landsat go to: 1.usa.gov/XSYBZ2

 

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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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The stars and stripes on the American flag reflect NASA's commitment to teamwork as the Constellation Program's Ares I-X test rocket roars 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/Jim Grossmann

 

Original image:

mediaarchive.ksc.nasa.gov/detail.cfm?mediaid=43932

 

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!

A ticket for Kay Kyser's Kollege of Musical Knowledge, a musical quiz show featuring bandleader Kay Kyser that ran on radio from 1938 to 1949. Although the ticket displays the correct spelling of "College," the program's name typically appeared as "Kollege" with an initial "K."

 

Kay Kyser's College of Musical Knowledge

 

Fox Theatre, San Bernardino.

 

Hold this ticket! If your number is called—notify a theatre attendant, and he will escort you to the stage.

 

001015.

 

Globe Ticket Company, Los Angeles.

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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To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

A photo credit mentioning the Chesapeake Bay Program is mandatory. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way or used in any way that suggests approval or endorsement of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Requestors should also respect the publicity rights of individuals photographed, and seek their consent if necessary.

A unicorn, not only being the emblem for an obscure (at least to me) program, but also in that it doesn’t quite match up with the other ‘more prevalent’ version of it. Maybe it’s an “oops” printing, since “Manned Spaceflight Program” (MSP?), which is not an actual/recognized term/acronym ≠ MSE. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

The design is a variation of the NASA Astronaut pin/device. See forthcoming linked image below.

  

Lengthy, but interesting:

 

“Blue Shuttle: The Manned Spaceflight Engineer Program

 

The Manned Spaceflight Engineer (MSE) Program was an attempt to train American military personnel as payload specialists for Department of Defense (DoD) Space Shuttle missions. Only two of the thirty-two MSE's selected flew in space in the nine years the program was active.

 

Since its official beginning in 1969, the US Air Force (USAF) and National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) participated in the development of the Space Shuttle. The most prominent military influence on the vehicle is the size of the orbiter's payload bay. Still retaining the desire to fly all-military space missions, like with the previous decade's Man In Space, X-20 Dynamic Soarer, and Manned Orbiting Laboratory programs, the DoD wanted its own Shuttles flown by its own crews. When this so-called "Blue Shuttle" was not granted, the Air Force settled with their own astronauts hitching rides with NASA missions to handle highly classified payloads, thus beginning the MSE Program.

 

The DoD required the MSE program to consist of officers from the Army, Navy, and Air Force. Each officer would remain at NASA for four to six years during which he or she would fly at least one Space Shuttle mission before returning to their respective branch. The requirements for the first group of candidates were the following:

 

- Have at least three to ten years of service as an officer on active duty

- Hold rank from First Lieutenant to Major

- Be able to pass the NASA Class III physical exam (required for all NASA payload specialists)

- Hold a Bachelor of Science in engineering, science, or space operations

- Have a minimum of two years of experience in program acquisition or testing and launch support of flight and missile operations

 

Flight backgrounds were not required but candidates also needed appropriate security clearances to be able to work on specific classified payloads. Originally, twelve Air Force and two Navy officers were chosen but one from each branch declined. The naval officer was not replaced but the Air Force officer was replaced by Gary Payton. The thirteen MSE's were selected in 1979. All officers could anticipate flying at least once and some twice.

 

- 1st Lt. Frank Casserino, USAF

- 1st Lt. Jeffrey Detroye, USAF

- Capt. Michael Halem, USAF

- Capt. Terry Higbee, USAF

- Capt. Daryl Joseph, USAF

- Capt. Malcolm Lydon, USAF

- Capt. Gary Payton, USAF

- Capt. Jerry Rij, USAF

- Maj. Paul Sefchek, USAF

- Maj. Eric Sundberg, USAF

- Lt. Cmdr. David Vidrine, USN

- Capt. Keith Wright, USAF

- Capt. Brett Watterson, USAF

 

At the time, NASA had yet to define its own payload specialist training program so the agency was not sure how to train the new MSE's. The Air Force did not want the MSE's to go through standard NASA astronaut training because they were supposed to enter back into the service after their Shuttle flights— most military officers who became NASA astronauts never returned. When the Air Force refused to put its own astronaut candidates through general NASA training, the agency refused to provide any assistance: It was NASA's belief that since it did not select the MSE's, it did not have control over them. This led to persistent tension between NASA and the visiting MSE's. The DoD came up with its own training program, consisting of underwater EVA and manned maneuvering unit simulations at NASA Marshall and Martin Marietta [1], Shuttle mission simulations at Rockwell [2], and T-38 training at Edwards Air Force Base for those with previous flight experience. In late 1981, the first cadre of MSE's completed training.

 

The second class of MSE's, this time consisting of fourteen Air Force officers, was selected in August 1982 and began training the following May. Selection criteria were the same but did not emphasize science, engineering, and space operations backgrounds. For example, Captains James Armor and Craig Puz were commanders of Minuteman missile crews while Captain Randy Odle was a bio-environmental researcher at RAF Alconbury in the United Kingdom. This cadre included two women, 1st Lieutenant Maureen LaComb and Captain Katherine Roberts, and one African American, Captain Livingston Holder. Captain Charles Jones was killed in the September 11 hijacking in 2001 [3]. Due to the size of the MSE corps, the second class was told only half of them might fly in space.

 

- Capt. James Armor

- 1st Lt. Michael Booen

- Capt. Livingston Holder

- Capt. Larry James

- Capt. Charles Jones

- 1st Lt. Maureen LaComb

- Capt. Michael Mantz

- Capt. Randy Odle

- Capt. William Pailes

- Capt. Craig Puz

- Capt. Katherine Roberts

- Capt. Jess Sponable

- Capt. W. Davis Thompson

- Capt. Glenn Yeakel

 

MSE's Sefchek and Watterson worked on the STS-4 payload, the P-80-1 experiment package, while Casserino, Detroye, and Payton were "paycoms" (payload communicators) at the Air Force Satellite Control Facility in Sunnydale, California. In early 1982, seven MSE's were chosen as prime and backup candidates for three Shuttle missions scheduled for 1983 and '84. These flights were delayed due to issues with their payloads [4], which were developed by TRW, Hughes, Martin Marietta, and Lockheed under the direction of the NRO. Setbacks in the program reignited the decades-old debate inside the Air Force on the usefulness and feasibility of manned spaceflight. It also resulted in the DoD developing a new unmanned rocket capable of launching Shuttle payload bay-sized payloads into geosynchronous orbit, an orbit frequently occupied by military satellites. This vehicle became the Titan IV and flew from 1989 to 2005. Vidrine was a candidate for a payload specialist "observer" on STS-41-C (originally STS-13) and participated in flight simulations with commander Bob Crippen. One month before the scheduled April launch the Space Division refused to authorize Vidrine's flight because it had "no value" to the Air Force and he was removed from the crew. In late 1985 three officers from the Air Weather Service were selected for the Weather Officer in Space Experiment flight which never took place [5].

 

In late 1984, Brett Watterson was assigned as payload specialist to STS-62A, the planned first Shuttle mission from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Two successful DoD-dedicated Shuttle missions flew Gary Payton and William Pailes of the second class in 1985. This resulted in an additional five DoD missions scheduled for 1986 and '87 along with STS-62A and two launches of the Navstar GPS satellites. A third cadre of five more MSE's rounded out the program's astronaut corps in 1985.

 

- Capt. Joseph Caretto

- Capt. Robert Crombie

- Capt. Frank DeArmond

- Capt. David Staib

- 1st Lt. Teresa Stevens

 

After the Challenger disaster in early 1986, however, NASA was more concerned with making it safe to fly again than it was with the MSE's. Administrator James Fletcher expressed the desire to fly five-member crews and potentially eliminate the position of "payload specialist". By the end of 1987, only ten officers remained active. The Manned Spaceflight Engineer program ended in 1988 primarily due to lack of need for crewed DoD missions now that an uncrewed heavy-lift launch vehicle was available [6]. The DoD, yet again, had lost manned space capability.

 

Black and Blue: The Real DoD Shuttle Missions

 

Despite the unsuccessfulness of the Manned Spaceflight Engineer program, a total of eleven Shuttle flights flew with classified payloads and required a higher level of secrecy than regular NASA flights. Although the DoD requested the media not disclose flight details to maintain confidentiality, the press nonetheless reported whatever they could using open-source intelligence. An example of this is correlating the direction of the Shuttle after liftoff with orbital inclination— different payloads require different orbits to operate properly. Unlike with other Shuttle missions, NASA began public countdowns for DoD launches only a few minutes before liftoff, did not distribute press kits, and did not broadcast Shuttle-to-ground communications. With two exceptions, only active-duty military NASA astronauts flew these missions [7]. Below are those missions:

 

- STS-4

- STS-51C

- STS-51J

- STS-27

- STS-28

- STS-33

- STS-36

- STS-38

- STS-39

- STS-44

- STS-53

 

In 1993, after the final DoD mission flew, all crew members of classified flights were awarded the National Intelligence Achievement Medal. Some details of these missions are still classified three or four decades later.

 

California Dreamin': Vandenberg and the Space Shuttle

 

The DoD was also interested in flying polar-orbital Shuttle missions. These flights could not launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida because they would have flown over populated areas along the southeastern United States. Additionally, the external fuel tank would have traveled over not only Canada but Soviet Russia and possibly China. Space Launch Complex-6 (SLC-6 or "Slick Six") was constructed at Vandenberg Air Force Base (now Space Force Base) in California in the mid-1960s to support Titan III launches for the Manned Orbiting Laboratory program. It was refurbished and upgraded in the '80s for the Space Shuttle. The planned inaugural flight was to be STS-62A Discovery launching in the summer of 1986. Its primary objective was to deploy Teal Ruby, an experimental early warning satellite. The mission also would have performed a series of Earth atmospheric observations using telescopes and instruments in the orbiter's payload bay. Payload specialist no. 2 was Brett Watterson, an MSE from the first class of DoD astronauts. Due to the poor relationship between NASA astronauts and MSE's, Under Secretary of the Air Force and NRO Director Pete Aldridge was named payload specialist no. 1. After the mission was cancelled post-Challenger, STS-62A's pilot and two mission specialists (Guy Gardner, Mike Mullane, and Jerry Ross, respectively) flew STS-27 in 1988. Aldridge was promoted to Secretary of the Air Force.

 

Although STS-62-A was the only mission with a full crew planned before Californian operations ceased, two more missions were in the early planning stages. STS-62B, set to launch in late 1986 [8], would have included Kathrine Roberts as a payload specialist and would have deployed the KH-12 Advanced Kennan reconnaissance satellite. STS-82B would have deployed the Cosmic Background Explorer observatory, which later launched on a Delta rocket in 1989. Aldridge directed the Air Force to transfer all Shuttle assets from Vandenberg to the Kennedy Space Center and the Vandenberg extension of the Shuttle program was terminated on December 26, 1989. SLC-6 and its sister pads on the west coast are still active, though, and the most recent launch from SLC-6 was a Delta IV Heavy on April 26, 2021.

  

[1] Martin Marietta was responsible for the Manned Maneuvering Unit, a "jetpack" that allowed astronauts to perform untethered EVAs.

[2] Space Shuttle orbiters were assembled at Rockwell's facility in Palmdale, California.

[3] He is memorialized at the North Pool on Panel N-74 at the National 9/11 Memorial

[4] These missions are difficult to describe because they are listed by their original designations, such as STS-16. STS-16 was later designated STS-41-H. However, no mission called STS-41-H ever took place. The original STS-16 may have taken place in 1985 instead, giving it a new designation such as STS-51-[letter].

[5] I was unable to find any further information about the Weather Officer in Space Experiment but what I included in this post came from the reference with the asterisk (*)

[6] Similarly, twenty years earlier a more reliable unmanned reconnaissance satellite caused the cancellation of the Manned Orbiting Laboratory program.

[7] The exceptions are former Marine Story Musgrave and former DoD scientist Kathryn Thornton, both of whom flew on STS-33.

[8] Discovery was the only Shuttle planned to launch from SLC-6. However, it was found that turnaround time at Vandenberg was not fast enough to have STS-62B launch in 1986 so it likely would have launched in the first half of 1987.”

 

The above, slightly paraphrased, at/from:

 

www.spaceflighthistories.com/post/blue-shuttle

Credit: Aeryn Avilla/”SPACEFLIGHT HISTORIES” website

 

The above individual I believe gleaned much/most of her content from the following 1989 article written by Michael Cassutt. Click at your own risk, even though it looks (or is made to look?) like it’s no longer maintained, it’s a Godless Russian website nonetheless, so anything nefarious is possible/to be expected:

 

epizodsspace.narod.ru/bibl/spaceflight/31/mse.html

 

Multiple other sites are available regarding the MSE Program, although it’s mostly circular reporting.

 

Another view of the ‘more prevalent’ version of the emblem:

 

www.spacepatchdatabase.com/patches/space-shuttle/manned-s...

Credit: “Space Patch Database” website

 

Interesting:

 

www.losangeles.spaceforce.mil/News/Article-Display/Articl...

Credit: LOS ANGELES AIR FORCE BASE website

 

Who knew???

Did you!?!

I didn't!!!

The intersection of West 63rd Street and Broadway — where the Sesame Workshop offices are located — has been renamed as part of the program's 50th anniversary celebration.

 

-- CNN

The mouth of Back River is seen in Baltimore County, Md., on June 27, 2016. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program with aerial support by LightHawk)

 

USAGE REQUEST INFORMATION

The Chesapeake Bay Program's photographic archive is available for media and non-commercial use at no charge. To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

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IMAGE VIEW INFORMATION

- This view is looking south-west, from the northern shoreline of what was then called "Mimosa Bay" (later re-named to "Scylla Bay", sometime between 1911-1922).

- "Scylla Bay" was later mostly back-filled to create a sports ground, during the worst of the Great Depression years (approx. 1929-1935).

- The date of this image (and others taken by Star Photo Co. at the same time) HAS to be prior to approx. mid 1895, since J.H. Wills' first boatshed (approved for construction in Dec 1894) has not yet been built in their other images taken at Como at the same time.

- The iconic & historic original version of the Victorian styled Como Hotel can be seen here. It was (accidentally) burnt down in Nov 1996, then a completely new version was constructed - mostly true to the original plans - that stands today.

- Note the other members of the Star Photo Co. photographic team posing for this great historic shot.

*******************************

RESTORATION INFO

- Original digital image held in the New South Wales State Library online image collection.

- This copy was downloaded & restored by myself using Adobe Photoshop Creative Suite 8.0 (with duo-tone enhancement) for public share via Flickr.

*******************************

COPYRIGHT & CREDITS

- Credit goes to Star Photo Co. (1894-1928), the creator of the original image, & to the Mitchell & State Libraries of New South Wales for their valuable historic photograph scanning & digitization program(s).

- The original image is no longer restricted by any form of Copyright, per State Library of New South Wales copyright advice -

"Out of Copyright

Reason for copyright status: Created/Published Date is Before 1955

Material type: Photograph

COPYRIGHT AND PERMISSIONS:

This image may be used freely for research and study purposes. Further use may require permission. Please acknowledge that the image is from the collections of the State Library of New South Wales".

- As for my own work in restoring this unique image, all I ask for is an acknowledgement if it is downloaded & used by anyone else (eg: for research, learning, review or sharing).

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ADDITIONAL HISTORIC INFORMATION

- STAR PHOTO CO. was operated by the proprietor William Livermore (chief photographer). I found an early notice in the Daily Commercial News & Shipping List (Sydney) which shows the Star Photo Co. had imported 1 case of "pictures" (probably photographic glass plates) from Victoria, passing Customs on 3 Apr 1894. I would suggest most other entries found on websites that claim the Star Photo Co. was only operational from 1898 would appear to be incorrect. Clearly, the Co. was actively engaged in the photographic business from at least as early as Apr 1894.

- RENAMING OF MIMOSA BAY TO SCYLLA BAY (circa 1911-1922)

"Sutherland Council's Works Committee have recommended the erection of a wharf and baths near Mimosa Bay. The Committee were also of opinion that if the road from Como to Sutherland could be constructed for £150 it should be considered" - The St George Call, Sat 26 Aug 1911.

- However, by Jul 1922 residential land at the newly created "Scylla Bay Heights" estate in Como was being advertised as far away as Wyalong, New South Wales - in The Wyalong Advocate and Mining, Agricultural and Pastoral Gazette, Friday 28 July 1922.

Italy’s first F-35A Lightning II, known as AL-1 and assembled at the Cameri Final Assembly and Check Out (FACO) facility, flew for the first time on Sept. 7, 2015, marking the program’s first-ever F-35 flight outside the United States. Learn more: www.f35.com/news/detail/italys-f-35a-flies-inaugural-euro...

The United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) spacecraft onboard is seen as it launches on Monday, Feb. 11, 2013 at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) mission is a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey that will continue the Landsat Program's 40-year data record of monitoring the Earth's landscapes from space.

 

Photo Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

 

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The NB-52B was B-52B number 52-0008 converted to an X-15 launch platform. It subsequently flew as “Balls 8” in support of NASA research until 17 December 2004, making it the oldest flying B-52B. A modified B-52H replaced it. The NB-52B was credited with 140 of the 199 X-15 flights. To carry the X-15 aloft, it was mounted to a specially designed pylon that fit underneath the starboard wing, between the 3 and 4-engine pod and the fuselage. The inboard flap was modified to accommodate the rocket plane’s vertical tail.

 

The NB-52B also participated in many other important projects, including the lifting body research aircraft program sponsored by the Air Force and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Started in 1966, the program's test flights were still going on in late 1973, with Martin Marietta's needle-nosed X-24 soon to be tested with the NB-52B. The permanently modified B-52B was also used to test solid rocket boosters for the space shuttle. Moreover, as a mother ship, it was expected to play an active role in the remotely piloted research vehicle program, another joint project of the Air Force and NASA.

 

In this image, “Balls 8” takes the X-15A aloft on its test flights. To fit the X-15 under the wing, a small trailing edge cut-out was required to the starboard inboard flap and part of the wing. During the drop, the X-15 pilot had to keep the aircraft within a 20-degree roll to prevent the vertical stabilizer from contacting the starboard wing.

 

The Kliment Voroshilov (KV) tanks were a series of Soviet heavy tanks, named after the Soviet defense commissar and politician Kliment Voroshilov. The KV series were known for their extremely heavy armour protection during the early war, especially during the first year of the invasion of the Soviet Union in World War II. Almost completely immune to the 3.7 cm KwK 36 and howitzer-like, short barreled 7.5 cm KwK 37 guns mounted respectively on the early Panzer III and Panzer IV tanks, until better guns were developed often the only way to defeat a KV was a point-blank shot to the rear. Prior to the invasion, about 500 of the over 22,000 tanks in Soviet service at the time were of the KV-1 type. When the KV-1 appeared, it outclassed the French Char B1, the only heavy tank used in the world at that time. Yet in the end it turned out that there was little sense in producing the expensive KV tanks, as the T-34 medium tank performed better (or at least equally) in all practical respects. Later in the war, the KV series became a base of development of the Iosif Stalin tanks.

Development

After disappointing results with the multi-turreted T-35 heavy tank, Soviet tank designers started drawing up replacements. The T-35 conformed to the 1920s notion of a 'breakthrough tank' with very heavy firepower and armour protection, but suffered from poor mobility. The Spanish Civil War demonstrated the need for much heavier armor on tanks, and was the main influence on Soviet tank design just prior to World War II.

 

Several competing designs were offered, and even more were drawn up prior to reaching prototype stage. All had heavy armour, torsion-bar suspension, wide tracks, and were of welded and cast construction. One of the main competing designs was the SMK, which in its final form had two turrets, mounting the same combination of 76.2 mm and 45 mm weapons. The designers of the SMK independently drew up a single-turreted variant and this received approval at the highest level. Two of these, named after the People's Defence Commissioner were ordered alongside a single SMK. The smaller hull and single turret enabled the designer to install heavy frontal and turret armour while keeping the weight within manageable limits.

  

When the Soviets entered the Winter War, the SMK, KV and a third design, the T-100, were sent to be tested in combat conditions. The KV outperformed the SMK and T-100 designs. The KV's heavy armour proved highly resistant to Finnish anti-tank weapons, making it more difficult to stop. In 1939 production of 50 KV was ordered. During the War, the Soviets found it difficult to deal with the concrete bunkers used by the Finns and a request was made for a tank with a large howitzer. One of the rush projects to meet the request put the howitzer in a new turret on one of the KV tanks.

 

Initially known as Little Turret and Big turret, the 76-mm-armed tank was designated as the KV-1 Heavy Tank and the 152 mm howitzer one as KV-2 Heavy Artillery Tank.

 

The KV's strengths included armor that was impenetrable by any tank-mounted weapon then in service except at point-blank range, that it had good firepower, and that it had good traction on soft ground. It also had serious flaws: it was difficult to steer, the transmission (which was a twenty year old Caterpillar design) was unreliable (and was known to have to be shifted with a hammer),[6] and the ergonomics were poor, with limited visibility and no turret basket. Furthermore, at 45 tons, it was simply too heavy. This severely impacted the maneuverability, not so much in terms of maximum speed, as through inability to cross many bridges medium tanks could cross. The KV outweighed most other tanks of the era, being about twice as heavy as the heaviest contemporary German tank. KVs were never equipped with a snorkeling system to ford shallow rivers, so they had to be left to travel to an adequate bridge. As applique armor and other improvements were added without increasing engine power, later models were less capable of keeping up to speed with medium tanks and had more trouble with difficult terrain. In addition, its firepower was no better than the T-34. It took field reports from senior commanders "and certified heroes", who could be honest without risk of punishment, to reveal "what a dog the KV-1.

By 1942, when the Germans were fielding large numbers of long-barrelled 50 mm and 75 mm guns, the KV's armor was no longer invincible. The KV-1's side, top, and turret armor could also be penetrated by the high-velocity MK 101 carried by German ground attack aircraft such as the Henschel Hs 129, requiring the installation of additional field-expedient appliqué armour. The KV-1's 76.2 mm gun also came in for criticism. While adequate against all German tanks, it was the same gun as carried by smaller, faster, and cheaper T-34 medium tanks. In 1943, it was determined that this gun could not penetrate the frontal armour of the new Tiger,the first German heavy tank, fortunately captured near Leningrad. The KV-1 was also much more difficult to manufacture and thus more expensive than the T-34. In short, its advantages no longer outweighed its drawbacks.

 

Nonetheless, because of its initial superior performance, the KV-1 was chosen as one of the few tanks to continue being built following the Soviet reorganization of tank production. Due to the new standardization, it shared the similar engine (the KV used a 600 hp V-2K modification of the T-34's V-2 diesel engine) and gun (the KV had a ZiS-5 main gun, while the T-34 had a similar F-34 main gun) as the T-34, was built in large quantities, and received frequent upgrades.

When production shifted to the Ural Mountains 'Tankograd' complex, the KV-2 was dropped. While impressive on paper, it had been designed as a slow-moving bunker-buster. It was less useful in highly mobile, fluid warfare that developed in World War II. The turret was so heavy it was difficult to traverse on non-level terrain, and it was expensive to produce. Only about 300 KV-2s were made, all in 1940-41, making it one of the rarer Soviet tanks. Many KV-2s were later converted into KV-1s.

As the war continued, the KV-1 continued to get more armour to compensate for the increasing effectiveness of German weapons. This culminated in the KV-1 model 1942 (German designation KV-1C), which had very heavy armour, but lacked a corresponding improvement to the engine. Tankers complained that although they were well-protected, their mobility was poor and they had no firepower advantage over the T-34 medium tank.[citation needed]

 

In response to criticisms, the lighter KV-1S (Russian language: КВ-1С) was released, with thinner armour and a smaller, lower turret in order to reclaim some speed. Importantly, the KV-1S also had a commander's cupola with all-around vision blocks, a first for a Soviet heavy tank. However, the thinning-out of the armor called into question why the tank was being produced at all, when the T-34 could seemingly do everything the KV could do and much more cheaply. The Soviet heavy tank program was close to cancellation in mid-1943.

 

The appearance of the German Panther tank in the summer of 1943 convinced the Red Army to make a serious upgrade of its tank force for the first time since 1941. Soviet tanks needed bigger guns to take on the growing numbers of Panthers and the few Tigers.

 

A stopgap upgrade to the KV series was the short-lived KV-85 or Objekt 239. This was a KV-1S with a new turret designed for the IS-85, mounting the same 85 mm D-5T gun as the SU-85 and early versions of the T-34-85; demand for the gun slowed production of the KV-85 tremendously and only 148 were built before the KV design was replaced. The KV-85 was produced in the fall and winter of 1943-44; they were sent to the front as of September 1943 and production of the KV-85 was stopped by the spring of 1944 once the IS-2 entered full scale production.

Successor

 

A new heavy tank design entered production late in 1943 based on the work done on the KV-13. Because Kliment Voroshilov had fallen out of political favour, the new heavy tank series was named the Iosif Stalin tank, after Iosif (Joseph) Stalin. The KV-13 program's IS-85 prototype was accepted for production as the IS-1 (or IS-85, Object 237) heavy tank. After testing with both 100 mm and 122 mm guns, the D-25T 122 mm gun was selected as the main armament of the new tank, primarily because of its ready availability and the effect of its large high-explosive shell when attacking German fortifications. The 122mm D-25T used a separate shell and powder charge, resulting in a lower rate of fire and reduced ammunition capacity. While the 122mm armour piercing shell had a lower muzzle velocity than similar late German 7.5 cm and 8.8 cm guns, proving-ground tests showed that the 122mm AP shell could defeat the frontal armour of the German Panther tank, and the HE shell would easily blow off the drive sprocket and tread of the heaviest German tank or self-propelled gun. The IS-122 replaced the IS-85, and began mass production as the IS-2. The 85 mm gun saw service in the lighter SU-85 and T-34-85.

  

A destroyed Soviet KV-1 in Olonets, September 1941, during the Continuation War

Some KVs remained in service right up to the end of the war, although in greatly diminishing numbers as they wore out or were knocked out. The 260th Guards Heavy Breakthrough Tank Regiment, based on the Leningrad front, operated a number of 1941-vintage KV-1s at least as late as the summer of 1944 before re-equipping with IS-2s. A regiment of KVs saw service in Manchuria in August 1945, and a few KV-85s were used in the Crimea in the summer of 1944. The Finnish forces had two KVs, nicknamed Klimi, a Model 1940 and Model 1941, both of which received minor upgrades in their service, and both of which survived the war. A single captured KV-2 was used by German forces in 1945 against US forces in the Ruhr.

  

Specifications (KV-1 Model 1941)

Weight - 45 tonnes

Length - 6.75 m (22 ft 2 in)

Width - 3.32 m (10 ft 11 in)

Height -2.71 m (8 ft 11 in)

Crew - 5

Armour - 90 mm maximum

Main armament -76.2 mm model F-34 gun

Secondary armament - 3× or 4× DT machine guns

Engine - 12-cylinder diesel model V-2 600 hp (450 kW)

Power/weight - 13 hp/tonne

Suspension - Torsion bar

Operational range - 335 km

Speed - 35 km/h (22 mph)

   

Penn Theatre Arts Fall 2015 Mainstage Production

 

Directed by Dr. James F. Schlatter.

 

The Theatre Arts Program’s fall production, BURY THE DEAD, written by Irwin Shaw in 1936, is set “in the second year of the war that is to begin tomorrow night.” The scene is an unnamed battlefield somewhere in the world that also serves as the gravesite for six dead American soldiers. About to be interred, the six young soldiers stand up in their shared grave and plead not to be buried. This crisis is the focus of Shaw’s harrowing and deeply moving and provocative play, directed by Theatre Arts faculty member, Dr. James F. Schlatter, Can a war ever end if the dead won’t be buried? The play will be performed by an ensemble company.

 

Performances:

November 18–21, 7:00pm

@ Annenberg Center Live, Bruce Montgomery Theatre

 

theatre.sas.upenn.edu/events/fall-mainstage-production-bu...

 

provost.upenn.edu/initiatives/arts/stories/2015/11/16/the...

 

A red maple tree is seen at 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)

 

USAGE REQUEST INFORMATION

The Chesapeake Bay Program's photographic archive is available for media and non-commercial use at no charge. To request permission, send an email briefly describing the proposed use to requests@chesapeakebay.net. Please do not attach jpegs. Instead, reference the corresponding Flickr URL of the image.

 

A photo credit mentioning the Chesapeake Bay Program is mandatory. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way or used in any way that suggests approval or endorsement of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Requestors should also respect the publicity rights of individuals photographed, and seek their consent if necessary.

On Sept. 20, 1979, the Marshall Space Flight Center’s third and final High Energy Astronomy Observatory (HEAO-C) was launched from Kennedy Space Center aboard an Atlas-Centaur vehicle. Known as HEAO-3 after its insertion into orbit, HEAO-C continued the program’s mission of probing the electromagnetic spectrum beyond the X-ray level, discovering a multitude of gamma and cosmic rays. Utilizing a gamma-ray spectrometer, a cosmic-ray isotope experiment, and a heavy cosmic-ray nuclei experiment to bring images of supernova remnants, pulsars, and distant galaxies into focus, the three HEAO missions propelled forward the then emerging field of high energy astrophysics. The HEAO-3 project was managed by Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., with TRW, Inc. serving as the primary contractor.

 

Image credit: NASA/MSFC

 

Original image: www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/history/gallery/launch-of-h...

 

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...

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

Pasted from Wikipedia: Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey

 

• • • • •

 

The Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey is a multi-mission, military, tiltrotor aircraft with both a vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capability. It is designed to combine the functionality of a conventional helicopter with the long-range, high-speed cruise performance of a turboprop aircraft.

 

The V-22 originated from the U.S. Department of Defense Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program started in 1981. It was developed jointly by the Bell Helicopter, and Boeing Helicopters team, known as Bell Boeing, which produce the aircraft.[4] The V-22 first flew in 1989, and began years of flight testing and design alterations.

 

The United States Marine Corps began crew training for the Osprey in 2000, and fielded it in 2007. The Osprey's other operator, the U.S. Air Force fielded their version of the tiltrotor in 2009. Since entering service with the U.S. Marine Corps and Air Force, the Osprey has been deployed for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

Contents

 

• 1 Development

•• 1.1 Early development

•• 1.2 Flight testing and design changes

•• 1.3 Controversy

•• 1.4 Recent development

• 2 Design

• 3 Operational history

•• 3.1 US Marine Corps

•• 3.2 US Air Force

•• 3.3 Potential operators

• 4 Variants

• 5 Operators

• 6 Notable accidents

• 7 Specifications (MV-22B)

• 8 Notable appearances in media

• 9 See also

• 10 References

• 11 External links

 

Development

 

Early development

 

The failure of the Iran hostage rescue mission in 1980 demonstrated to the United States military a need[5] for "a new type of aircraft, that could not only take off and land vertically but also could carry combat troops, and do so at speed."[6] The U.S. Department of Defense began the Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program in 1981, under U.S. Army leadership. Later the U.S. Navy/Marine Corps took the lead.[7][8] The JVX combined requirements from the Marine Corps, Air Force, Army and Navy.[9][10] A request for proposals (RFP) was issued in December 1982 for JVX preliminary design work. Interest in the program was expressed by Aérospatiale, Bell Helicopter, Boeing Vertol, Grumman, Lockheed, and Westland. The DoD pushed for contractors to form teams. Bell partnered with Boeing Vertol. The Bell Boeing team submitted a proposal for a enlarged version of the Bell XV-15 prototype on 17 February 1983. This was the only proposal received and a preliminary design contract was awarded on 26 April 1983.[11][12]

 

The JVX aircraft was designated V-22 Osprey on 15 January 1985; by March that same year the first six prototypes were being produced, and Boeing Vertol was expanded to deal with the project workload.[13][14] Work has been split evenly between Bell and Boeing. Bell Helicopter manufactures and integrates the wing, nacelles, rotors, drive system, tail surfaces, and aft ramp, as well as integrates the Rolls-Royce engines and performs final assembly. Boeing Helicopters manufactures and integrates the fuselage, cockpit, avionics, and flight controls.[4][15] The USMC variant of the Osprey received the MV-22 designation and the Air Force variant received CV-22; reversed from normal procedure to prevent Marine Ospreys from having a conflicting designation with aircraft carriers (CV).[16] Full-scale development of the V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft began in 1986.[2] On 3 May 1986 the Bell-Boeing partnership was awarded a $1.714 billion contract for V-22 aircraft by the Navy, thus at this point the project had acquisition plans with all four arms of the U.S. military.[17]

 

The first V-22 was rolled out with significant media attention in May 1988.[18][19] However the project suffered several political blows. Firstly in the same year, the Army left the program, citing a need to focus its budget on more immediate aviation programs.[20] The project also faced considerable dialogue in the Senate, surviving two votes that both could have resulted in cancellation.[21][22] Despite the Senate's decision, the Department of Defense instructed the Navy not to spend more money on the Osprey.[23] At the same time, the Bush administration sought the cancellation of the project.[23]

 

Flight testing and design changes

 

The first of six MV-22 prototypes first flew on 19 March 1989 in the helicopter mode,[24] and on 14 September 1989 as a fixed-wing plane.[25] The third and fourth prototypes successfully completed the Osprey's first Sea Trials on the USS Wasp in December 1990.[26] However, the fourth and fifth prototypes crashed in 1991-92.[27] Flight tests were resumed in August 1993 after changes were incorporated in the prototypes.[2] From October 1992 until April 1993, Bell and Boeing redesigned the V-22 to reduce empty weight, simplify manufacture and reduce production costs. This redesigned version became the B-model.[28]

 

Flight testing of four full-scale development V-22s began in early 1997 when the first pre-production V-22 was delivered to the Naval Air Warfare Test Center, Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland. The first EMD flight took place on 5 February 1997. The first of four low rate initial production aircraft, ordered on 28 April 1997, was delivered on 27 May 1999. Osprey number 10 completed the program's second Sea Trials, this time from the USS Saipan in January 1999.[2] During external load testing in April 1999, Boeing used a V-22 to lift and transport the M777 howitzer.[29] In 2000, Boeing announced that the V-22 would be fitted with a nose-mounted GAU-19 Gatling gun,[30] but the GAU-19 gun was later canceled.[31]

 

In 2000, there were two further fatal crashes, killing a total of 19 Marines, and the production was again halted while the cause of these crashes was investigated and various parts were redesigned.[32] The V-22 completed its final operational evaluation in June 2005. The evaluation was deemed successful; events included long range deployments, high altitude, desert and shipboard operations. The problems identified in various accidents had been addressed.[33]

 

Controversy

 

The V-22's development process has been long and controversial, partly due to its large cost increases.[34] When the development budget, first planned for $2.5 billion in 1986, increased to a projected $30 billion in 1988, then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney tried to zero out its funding. He was eventually overruled by Congress.[32] As of 2008, $27 billion have been spent on the Osprey program and another $27.2 billion will be required to complete planned production numbers by the end of the program.[2]

 

The V-22 squadron's former commander at Marine Corps Air Station New River, Lt. Colonel Odin Lieberman, was relieved of duty in 2001 after allegations that he instructed his unit that they needed to falsify maintenance records to make the plane appear more reliable.[2][35] Three officers were later implicated in the falsification scandal.[34]

 

The aircraft is incapable of autorotation, and is therefore unable to land safely in helicopter mode if both engines fail. A director of the Pentagon's testing office in 2005 said that if the Osprey loses power while flying like a helicopter below 1,600 feet (490 m), emergency landings "are not likely to be survivable". But Captain Justin (Moon) McKinney, a V-22 pilot, says that this will not be a problem, "We can turn it into a plane and glide it down, just like a C-130".[31] A complete loss of power would require the failure of both engines, as a drive shaft connects the nacelles through the wing; one engine can power both proprotors.[36] While vortex ring state (VRS) contributed to a deadly V-22 accident, the aircraft is less susceptible to the condition than conventional helicopters and recovers more quickly.[5] The Marines now train new pilots in the recognition of and recovery from VRS and have instituted operational envelope limits and instrumentation to help pilots avoid VRS conditions.[32][37]

 

It was planned in 2000 to equip all V-22s with a nose-mounted Gatling gun, to provide "the V-22 with a strong defensive firepower capability to greatly increase the aircraft's survivability in hostile actions."[30] The nose gun project was canceled however, leading to criticism by retired Marine Corps Commandant General James L. Jones, who is not satisfied with the current V-22 armament.[31] A belly-mounted turret was later installed on some of the first V-22s sent to the War in Afghanistan in 2009.[38]

 

With the first combat deployment of the MV-22 in October 2007, Time Magazine ran an article condemning the aircraft as unsafe, overpriced, and completely inadequate.[31] The Marine Corps, however, responded with the assertion that much of the article's data were dated, obsolete, inaccurate, and reflected expectations that ran too high for any new field of aircraft.[39]

 

Recent development

 

On 28 September 2005, the Pentagon formally approved full-rate production for the V-22.[40] The plan is to boost production from 11 a year to between 24 and 48 a year by 2012. Of the 458 total planned, 360 are for the Marine Corps, 48 for the Navy, and 50 for the Air Force at an average cost of $110 million per aircraft, including development costs.[2] The V-22 had an incremental flyaway cost of $70 million per aircraft in 2007,[3] but the Navy hopes to shave about $10 million off that cost after a five-year production contract starts in 2008.[41]

 

The Bell-Boeing Joint Project Office in Amarillo, Texas will design a new integrated avionics processor to resolve electronics obsolescence issues and add new network capabilities.[42]

 

Design

 

The Osprey is the world's first production tiltrotor aircraft, with one three-bladed proprotor, turboprop engine, and transmission nacelle mounted on each wingtip. It is classified as a powered lift aircraft by the Federal Aviation Administration.[43] For takeoff and landing, it typically operates as a helicopter with the nacelles vertical (rotors horizontal). Once airborne, the nacelles rotate forward 90° in as little as 12 seconds for horizontal flight, converting the V-22 to a more fuel-efficient, higher-speed turboprop airplane. STOL rolling-takeoff and landing capability is achieved by having the nacelles tilted forward up to 45°. For compact storage and transport, the V-22's wing rotates to align, front-to-back, with the fuselage. The proprotors can also fold in a sequence taking 90 seconds.[44]

 

Most Osprey missions will use fixed wing flight 75 percent or more of the time, reducing wear and tear on the aircraft and reducing operational costs.[45] This fixed wing flight is higher than typical helicopter missions allowing longer range line-of-sight communications and so improved command and control.[2] Boeing has stated the V-22 design loses 10% of its vertical lift over a Tiltwing design when operating in helicopter mode because of airflow resistance due to the wings, but that the Tiltrotor design has better short takeoff and landing performance.[46]

 

The V-22 is equipped with a glass cockpit, which incorporates four Multi-function displays (MFDs) and one shared Central Display Unit (CDU), allowing the pilots to display a variety of images including: digimaps centered or decentered on current position, FLIR imagery, primary flight instruments, navigation (TACAN, VOR, ILS, GPS, INS), and system status. The flight director panel of the Cockpit Management System (CMS) allows for fully-coupled (aka: autopilot) functions which will take the aircraft from forward flight into a 50-foot hover with no pilot interaction other than programming the system.[47] The glass cockpit of the canceled CH-46X was derived from the V-22.[48]

 

The V-22 is a fly-by-wire aircraft with triple-redundant flight control systems.[49] With the nacelles pointing straight up in conversion mode at 90° the flight computers command the aircraft to fly like a helicopter, with cyclic forces being applied to a conventional swashplate at the rotor hub. With the nacelles in airplane mode (0°) the flaperons, rudder, and elevator fly the aircraft like an airplane. This is a gradual transition and occurs over the rotation range of the nacelles. The lower the nacelles, the greater effect of the airplane-mode control surfaces.[50] The nacelles can rotate past vertical to 97.5° for rearward flight.[51][52]

 

The Osprey can be armed with one M240 7.62x51mm NATO (.308 in caliber) or M2 .50 in caliber (12.7 mm) machine gun on the loading ramp, that can be fired rearward when the ramp is lowered. A GAU-19 three-barrel .50 in gatling gun mounted below the V-22's nose has also been studied for future upgrade.[31][53] BAE Systems developed a remotely operated turreted weapons system for the V-22,[54] which was installed on half of the first V-22s deployed to Afghanistan in 2009.[38] The 7.62 mm belly gun turret is remotely operated by a gunner inside the aircraft, who acquires targets with a separate pod using color television and forward looking infrared imagery.

 

U.S. Naval Air Systems Command is working on upgrades to increase the maximum speed from 250 knots (460 km/h; 290 mph) to 270 knots (500 km/h; 310 mph), increase helicopter mode altitude limit from 10,000 feet (3,000 m) to 12,000 feet (3,700 m) or 14,000 feet (4,300 m), and increase lift performance.[55]

 

Operational history

 

US Marine Corps

 

Marine Corps crew training on the Osprey has been conducted by VMMT-204 since March 2000. On 3 June 2005, the Marine Corps helicopter squadron Marine Medium Helicopter 263 (HMM-263), stood down to begin the process of transitioning to the MV-22 Osprey.[56] On 8 December 2005, Lieutenant General Amos, commander of the II MEF, accepted the delivery of the first fleet of MV-22s, delivered to HMM-263. The unit reactivated on 3 March 2006 as the first MV-22 squadron and was redesignated VMM-263. On 31 August 2006, VMM-162 (the former HMM-162) followed suit. On 23 March 2007, HMM-266 became Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 266 (VMM-266) at Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina.[57]

 

The Osprey has been replacing existing CH-46 Sea Knight squadrons.[58] The MV-22 reached initial operational capability (IOC) with the U.S. Marine Corps on 13 June 2007.[1] On 10 July 2007 an MV-22 Osprey landed aboard the Royal Navy aircraft carrier, HMS Illustrious in the Atlantic Ocean. This marked the first time a V-22 had landed on any non-U.S. vessel.[59]

 

On 13 April 2007, the U.S. Marine Corps announced that it would be sending ten V-22 aircraft to Iraq, the Osprey's first combat deployment. Marine Corps Commandant, General James Conway, indicated that over 150 Marines would accompany the Osprey set for September deployment to Al-Asad Airfield.[60][61] On 17 September 2007, ten MV-22Bs of VMM-263 left for Iraq aboard the USS Wasp. The decision to use a ship rather than use the Osprey's self-deployment capability was made because of concerns over icing during the North Atlantic portion of the trip, lack of available KC-130s for mid-air refueling, and the availability of the USS Wasp.[62]

 

The Osprey has provided support in Iraq, racking up some 2,000 flight hours over three months with a mission capable availability rate of 68.1% as of late-January 2008.[63] They are primarily used in Iraq's western Anbar province for routine cargo and troop movements, and also for riskier "aero-scout" missions. General David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, used one to fly around Iraq on Christmas Day 2007 to visit troops.[64] Then-presidential candidate Barack Obama also flew in Ospreys during his high profile 2008 tour of Iraq.[65]

 

The only major problem has been obtaining the necessary spare parts to maintain the aircraft.[66] The V-22 had flown 3,000 sorties totaling 5,200 hours in Iraq as of July 2008.[67] USMC leadership expect to deploy MV-22s to Afghanistan in 2009.[66][68] General George J. Trautman, III praised the increased range of the V-22 over the legacy helicopters in Iraq and said that "it turned his battle space from the size of Texas into the size of Rhode Island."[69]

 

Naval Air Systems Command has devised a temporary fix for sailors to place portable heat shields under Osprey engines to prevent damage to the decks of some of the Navy's smaller amphibious ships, but they determined that a long term solution to the problem would require these decks be redesigned with heat resistant deck coatings, passive thermal barriers and changes in ship structure in order to operate V-22s and F-35Bs.[70]

 

A Government Accountability Office study reported that by January 2009 the Marines had 12 MV-22s operating in Iraq and they managed to successfully complete all assigned missions. The same report found that the V-22 deployments had mission capable rates averaging 57% to 68% and an overall full mission capable rate of only 6%. It also stated that the aircraft had shown weakness in situational awareness, maintenance, shipboard operations and the ability to transport troops and external cargo.[71] That study also concluded that the "deployments confirmed that the V-22’s enhanced speed and range enable personnel and internal cargo to be transported faster and farther than is possible with the legacy helicopters it is replacing".[71]

 

The MV-22 saw its first offensive combat mission, Operation Cobra's Anger on 4 December 2009. Ospreys assisted in inserting 1,000 Marines and 150 Afghan troops into the Now Zad Valley of Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan to disrupt communication and supply lines of the Taliban.[38] In January 2010 the MV-22 Osprey is being sent to Haiti as part of Operation Unified Response relief efforts after the earthquake there. This will be the first use the Marine V-22 in a humanitarian mission.[72]

 

US Air Force

 

The Air Force's first operational CV-22 Osprey was delivered to the 58th Special Operations Wing (58th SOW) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico on 20 March 2006. This and subsequent aircraft will become part of the 58th SOW's fleet of aircraft used for training pilots and crew members for special operations use.[73] On 16 November 2006, the Air Force officially accepted the CV-22 in a ceremony conducted at Hurlburt Field, Florida.[74]

 

The US Air Force's first operational deployment of the Osprey sent four CV-22s to Mali in November 2008 in support of Exercise Flintlock. The CV-22s flew nonstop from Hurlburt Field, Florida with in-flight refueling.[5] AFSOC declared that the 8th Special Operations Squadron reached Initial Operational Capability on 16 March 2009, with six of its planned nine CV-22s operational.[75]

 

In June 2009, CV-22s of the 8th Special Operations Squadron delivered 43,000 pounds (20,000 kg) of humanitarian supplies to remote villages in Honduras that were not accessible by conventional vehicles.[76] In November 2009, the 8th SO Squadron and its six CV-22s returned from a three-month deployment in Iraq.[77]

 

The first possible combat loss of an Osprey occurred on 9 April, 2010, as a CV-22 went down near Qalat, Zabul Province, Afghanistan, killing four.[78][79]

 

Potential operators

 

In 1999 the V-22 was studied for use in the United Kingdom's Royal Navy,[80] it has been raised several times as a candidate for the role of Maritime Airborne Surveillance and Control (MASC).[81]

 

Israel had shown interest in the purchase of MV-22s, but no order was placed.[82][83] Flightglobal reported in late 2009 that Israel has decided to wait for the CH-53K instead.[84]

 

The V-22 Osprey is a candidate for the Norwegian All Weather Search and Rescue Helicopter (NAWSARH) that is planned to replace the Westland Sea King Mk.43B of the Royal Norwegian Air Force in 2015.[85] The other candidates for the NAWSARH contract of 10-12 helicopters are AgustaWestland AW101 Merlin, Eurocopter EC225, NHIndustries NH90 and Sikorsky S-92.[86]

 

Bell Boeing has made an unsolicited offer of the V-22 for US Army medical evacuation needs.[87] However the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency issued a report that said that a common helicopter design would be needed for both combat recovery and medical evacuation and that the V-22 would not be suitable for recovery missions because of the difficulty of hoist operations and lack of self-defense capabilities.[88]

 

The US Navy remains a potential user of the V-22, but its role and mission with the Navy remains unclear. The latest proposal is to replace the C-2 Greyhound with the V-22 in the fleet logistics role. The V-22 would have the advantage of being able to land on and support non-carriers with rapid delivery of supplies and people between the ships of a taskforce or to ships on patrol beyond helicopter range.[89] Loren B. Thompson of the Lexington Institute has suggested V-22s for use in combat search and rescue and Marine One VIP transport, which also need replacement aircraft.[90]

 

Variants

  

• V-22A 

•• Pre-production full-scale development aircraft used for flight testing. These are unofficially considered A-variants after 1993 redesign.[91]

  

• HV-22 

•• The U.S. Navy considered an HV-22 to provide combat search and rescue, delivery and retrieval of special warfare teams along with fleet logistic support transport. However, it chose the MH-60S for this role in 1992.[92]

  

• SV-22 

•• The proposed anti-submarine warfare Navy variant. The Navy studied the SV-22 in the 1980s to replace S-3 and SH-2 aircraft.[93]

  

• MV-22B 

•• Basic U.S. Marine Corps transport; original requirement for 552 (now 360). The Marine Corps is the lead service in the development of the V-22 Osprey. The Marine Corps variant, the MV-22B, is an assault transport for troops, equipment and supplies, capable of operating from ships or from expeditionary airfields ashore. It is replacing the Marine Corps' CH-46E[57] and CH-53D.[94]

  

• CV-22B 

•• Air Force variant for the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). It will conduct long-range, special operations missions, and is equipped with extra fuel tanks and terrain-following radar.[95][96]

 

Operators

 

•  United States

 

• United States Air Force

 

•• 8th Special Operations Squadron (8 SOS) at Hurlburt Field, Florida

•• 71st Special Operations Squadron (71 SOS) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico

•• 20th Special Operations Squadron (20 SOS) at Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico

 

• United States Marine Corps

 

•• VMM-161

•• VMM-162

•• VMM-261

•• VMM-263

•• VMM-264

•• VMM-266

•• VMM-365

•• VMMT-204 - Training squadron

•• VMX-22 - Marine Tiltrotor Operational Test and Evaluation Squadron

 

Notable accidents

 

Main article: Accidents and incidents involving the V-22 Osprey

 

From 1991 to 2000 there were four significant crashes, and a total of 30 fatalities, during testing.[32] Since becoming operational in 2007, the V-22 has had one possible combat loss due to an unknown cause, no losses due to accidents, and seven other notable, but minor, incidents.

 

• On 11 June 1991, a mis-wired flight control system led to two minor injuries when the left nacelle struck the ground while the aircraft was hovering 15 feet (4.6 m) in the air, causing it to bounce and catch fire.[97]

 

• On 20 July 1992, a leaking gearbox led to a fire in the right nacelle, causing the aircraft to drop into the Potomac River in front of an audience of Congressmen and other government officials at Quantico, killing all seven on board and grounding the aircraft for 11 months.[98]

 

• On 8 April 2000, a V-22 loaded with Marines to simulate a rescue, attempted to land at Marana Northwest Regional Airport in Arizona, stalled when its right rotor entered vortex ring state, rolled over, crashed, and exploded, killing all 19 on board.[37]

 

• On 11 December 2000, after a catastrophic hydraulic leak and subsequent software instrument failure, a V-22 fell 1,600 feet (490 m) into a forest in Jacksonville, North Carolina, killing all four aboard. This caused the Marine Corps to ground their fleet of eight V-22s, the second grounding that year.[99][100]

 

Specifications (MV-22B)

 

Data from Boeing Integrated Defense Systems,[101] Naval Air Systems Command,[102] US Air Force CV-22 fact sheet,[95] Norton,[103] and Bell[104]

 

General characteristics

 

• Crew: Four (pilot, copilot and two flight engineers)

• Capacity: 24 troops (seated), 32 troops (floor loaded) or up to 15,000 lb (6,800 kg) of cargo (dual hook)

• Length: 57 ft 4 in (17.5 m)

• Rotor diameter: 38 ft 0 in (11.6 m)

• Wingspan: 45 ft 10 in (14 m)

• Width with rotors: 84 ft 7 in (25.8 m)

• Height: 22 ft 1 in/6.73 m; overall with nacelles vertical (17 ft 11 in/5.5 m; at top of tailfins)

• Disc area: 2,268 ft² (212 m²)

• Wing area: 301.4 ft² (28 m²)

• Empty weight: 33,140 lb (15,032 kg)

• Loaded weight: 47,500 lb (21,500 kg)

• Max takeoff weight: 60,500 lb (27,400 kg)

• Powerplant: 2× Rolls-Royce Allison T406/AE 1107C-Liberty turboshafts, 6,150 hp (4,590 kW) each

 

Performance

 

• Maximum speed: 250 knots (460 km/h, 290 mph) at sea level / 305 kn (565 km/h; 351 mph) at 15,000 ft (4,600 m)[105]

• Cruise speed: 241 knots (277 mph, 446 km/h) at sea level

• Range: 879 nmi (1,011 mi, 1,627 km)

• Combat radius: 370 nmi (426 mi, 685 km)

• Ferry range: 1,940 nmi (with auxiliary internal fuel tanks)

• Service ceiling: 26,000 ft (7,925 m)

• Rate of climb: 2,320 ft/min (11.8 m/s)

• Disc loading: 20.9 lb/ft² at 47,500 lb GW (102.23 kg/m²)

• Power/mass: 0.259 hp/lb (427 W/kg)

 

Armament

 

• 1× M240 machine gun on ramp, optional

 

Notable appearances in media

 

Main article: Aircraft in fiction#V-22 Osprey

 

See also

 

• Elizabeth A. Okoreeh-Baah, USMC - first female to pilot a V-22 Osprey

 

Related development

 

• Bell XV-15[106]

• Bell/Agusta BA609

• Bell Boeing Quad TiltRotor

 

Comparable aircraft

 

• Canadair CL-84

• LTV XC-142

 

Related lists

 

• List of military aircraft of the United States

• List of VTOL aircraft

 

References

 

Bibliography

 

• Markman, Steve and Bill Holder. "Bell/Boeing V-22 Osprey Tilt-Engine VTOL Transport (U.S.A.)". Straight Up: A History of Vertical Flight. Schiffer Publishing, 2000. ISBN 0-7643-1204-9.

• Norton, Bill. Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey, Tiltrotor Tactical Transport. Midland Publishing, 2004. ISBN 1-85780-165-2.

 

External links

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: V-22 Osprey

 

• Official Boeing V-22 site

• Official Bell V-22 site

• V-22 Osprey web, and www.history.navy.mil/planes/v-22.html

• CV-22 fact sheet on USAF site

• www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/v-22.htm

• www.airforce-technology.com/projects/osprey/

• Onward and Upward

• "Flight of the Osprey", US Navy video of V-22 operations

The skipjack Dee of St. Mary's is docked on Back Creek, next to the Drum Point Lighthouse, at the Calvert Marine Museum in Solomons, Md., on May 7, 2017. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)

 

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The only Type C in the Wayne County Action Program's 4 bus fleet, number 13, awaits the call to duty. Built in 2002, 13 is the oldest bus on the fleet as well.

 

Plate: 12588BA (NY)

Built: 12-2002

MY: 2003

Body ID: 35154-0239950-943-NY-35-00WC-T88

Chassis ID: 58122

Workers on Launch Pad 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida make final preparations for launch of the Constellation Program's 327-foot-tall Ares I-X rocket. The rotating service structure and the arms of the vehicle stabilization system will be moved from around the rocket for liftoff. The transfer of the pad from the Space Shuttle Program to the Constellation Program took place May 31. Modifications made to the pad include the removal of shuttle unique subsystems, such as the orbiter access arm and a section of the gaseous oxygen vent arm, and the installation of three 600-foot lightning towers, access platforms, environmental control systems and a vehicle stabilization system. 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. The Ares I-X flight test is targeted for Oct. 27.

 

Image credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett

 

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!

Operation IceBridge team members board a U.S. Air Force C-17 transport aircraft for a flight from Christchurch, New Zealand, to the U.S. Antarctic Program's McMurdo Station in Antarctica on Nov. 12, 2013. The C-17s that ferry people, equipment and supplies to Antarctica are operated by the U.S. Air Force's 62nd and 446th Airlift Wings based at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Seattle, Wash.

 

NASA's Operation IceBridge is an airborne science mission to study Earth's polar ice. In 2013, IceBridge is conducting its first field campaign directly from Antarctica. For more information about IceBridge, visit: www.nasa.gov/icebridge

 

Credit: NASA/Goddard/Jefferson Beck

 

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+++ 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.