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The Eyes of the Space Shuttle
Roland Piquepaille writes "Now that Discovery astronaut Steve Robinson has successfully removed two pieces of fabric poking out of the shuttle's heat shield, a question remains: how did NASA discover these anomalies in the first place? In this article, Forbes.com writes that NASA can say thank you to a private Canadian company, Neptec, and its Laser Camera system (LCS). Neptec is working with NASA for ten years now, but it was the first time that its vision technology was used for external damage assessment of a shuttle. As NASA says it may cancel some future shuttle flights, Neptec plans to implement its 3-D imaging technology in military situations and on the battlefield. But read more for other details, references and pictures about this imaging technology."
and stop ripping off other websites content
Maybe the camera's not working right?
"It is possible to commit no errors and still lose. That is not a weakness. That is life." -Peak Performance
You might consider doing the same for all blog-type submissions, or anything that might be construed as an ad (see the "help me port my game" submission from earlier).
They keep finding things, though. Here's the latest.
Amazing how NASA turned into "Paranoid Scientists Incorporated" since Columbia...
"It felt almost as good as stealing cars from grandma." -- Margaret Thatcher, probably.
Roland Piquepaille shows his plagarist mug again, and the Slashdot editing staff is more than happy to give front page space to this known thief. Why can't the cowardly Slashdot staff simply confront the many who protest Roland's "stories" being posted? Where's the "open source" mentality which gets thrown around here so frequently. When will Slashdot admit they are hypocrites?
NASA has flown the shuttle well over 100 times, I believe (can't be bothered to check the exact number right now). So, how comes issues with falling pieces of foam and bits sticking out of the tiles are only cropping up now? I realize the STS fleet is aging, but still, it almost sounds like they've been incredibly lucky 100 times and haven't spotted the flaws until now, which sounds quite incredible.
Anybody in the know here could explain this?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Full Article
Older QNX PR Piece
Two Roland stories in two days! Slashdot must not be getting enough quality submissions from OTHER people.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
Roland's constant inane postings are just bringing down the overall quality. It should be a hint when there's a Firefox extension to remove him from the front page.
They crumped an X-15 with a hard landing during a rocket-failed-to-light landing emergency -- this accident caused serious back injury to pilot Jack MacKay leading to long-term health problems. While the pilot was able to recover to return to flying the X-15, the powers that be decided to rebuild that X-15 with extra fuel tanks.
When they tested that X-15 in high-speed flight, the front landing gear popped out at speed, the tire burnt up, and they had a rough landing on the melted tire. They figured that the rebuilt aircraft was longer and there was no longer enough slack on the landing gear deploy cable so that when the X-15 heated up from high Mach flight, the cable stretched and popped the gear out. Mind you the deployment system for the gear was no more complex than the brake cable on a bicycle because they wanted this to be ultra rugged and reliable because they had not second chances putting the wheels down on an unpowered landing (the Shuttle adopted the X-15 style landing).
So they lengthened the cable to the point where there was almost too much slack to yank on the T handle and get the gear down, but the next time they flew, the wheel popped out again during high Mach flight.
One of the pilots suggested putting one of these "placards" in the X-15 cockpit saying "Do not deploy gear above Mach 5."
The Shuttle has a lot of the characteristics of a research rather than a production aircraft. Don't think there is anything intrinsically bad with it apart from what they are trying to get out of it (production space flight).
He's correct about the change in spray on the foam - and that the old spray worked much better. I can't confirm if the change in spray was because of environmental reasons. I would advocate that NASA re-consider their decision on the old spray. I would even suggest that if the reason for no longer using the old spray was EPA related that NASA take the fight public; release all the pertinent data and see how many people would advocate an EPA exemption for the shuttle flights. Oh and for those of you who are now considering a reply that "erbmjw hates the environment" 1) I have been involved with numerous environmental causes in various roles. 2) There are some of us within the environmental movement that can understand the need for rare but extraordinarily useful exemptions. 3) I asked that NASA release all pertinent data!
Thank you for your balanced assessment of this situation.
Many slashdot readers detest the idea of their own comments being censored... but then whine about when slashdot excercises it's right to post what it bloody well wants on it's front page. They did the same thing with Jon Katz, their doing it with Roland, and when he's gone they'll find another target.
BTW- I think the filters are a fine idea too... The Right to not listen is just as important as the right to speak.
Blender And Linux Fan
Every time you click onto Roland Piquepaille's blog, God kills a kitten.
"Sure there's porn and piracy on the Web but there's probably a downside too."
If we can put aside all the Roland protests for a second, lets go a bit deeper into the actual story ...
... used to give more reach to the Canadarm. ... you know, that device that american media refers to only as the remote manipulator arm, never by its proper name, yes, the device that hauled in the Hubble telescope for repairs must never get the credit it is due. Remember how it's Canada insignia was removed to hide its origin during the big media coverage of the hubble events? Wouldn't want anyone to think that anyone other than the US can do anything great now would you!
... as well as taking more pictures to investigate the shuttle, the robotic arm that can go end over end inch worming between connection points along the space station ... the Canadarm2
Yes it is Canadian lidar technology that was used to scan the shuttle for damage.
But, what you'll never hear from any American media outlet is that the laser camera was mounted on the Canadian extention arm
And of course the lets not forget about the other big tool that helps assemble the space station
Do you Americans build any of the space hardware you use?
George Bush + Linux = "I will not let information get in the way of the fight against Windows"
I have no problem with a site that posts small excerpts and links to other people's news. I appreciate that there are people who take the time to go out and look for interesting things and post them. Then if I find the same things interesting I don't have to all that work. I love it when people (dj's) who are enthusiastic about music and actively seek out new stuff, and bring it to me every week. I like it when journalists do the same. I am even willing (and I do) support these people with money.
I do, however, have a problem with a site that posts small excerpts and links to other sites with small excerpts, which links to other sites with small excerpts and to get to the actual meat of the story you have to go play hopscotch through a bunch of worthless blogs, or do a google search. It defeats the entire purpose of an aggregator site which is to do the work of find interesting information, so I don't have to.
So, I don't have a problem with Roland's site. Heck, it seems to be better edited than Slashdot. I do have a problem with Slashdot constantly linking to it rather than to a direct source (or as direct of a source as they can find).