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Space Jackets Down to Earth
Roland Piquepaille writes "Several technologies used to design the space suits protecting astronauts are now being adapted to protect workers facing extremely hot and dangerous conditions. According to the European Space Agency (ESA), these 'space-cooled' jackets are using three different technologies: special 3D-textile structure, cooling apparatus derived from astronauts' suits, and a special water-binding polymer acting as a coating. Even if these protective clothes are primarily intended for firefighters or steel workers, several applications are possible, such as in sportswear or in cars as parts of air conditioning systems. Read more for additional details and pictures."
The only experience Europe has with space travel is situated in Sweden, and they have very long hair and annoying synth lines. Why doesn't the Europe Space Agency just save some of their taxpayer's money and ask NASA how they accomplished this AMAZING FEAT back in the 1980's?
But seriously, you'd think Europe would want to streamline their space budget since they're planning on releasing a technology to compete with the United States' GPS system, but if they keep throwing away money like this it won't happen anytime soon.
Space travel has not progressed like it should have in the decades following the amazing progress of the 1960s. Hell, it hasn't progressed like the exploration of the New World in the 1500s.
I feel that it is because we (as in, both Europe and the U.S.) have become completely and hopelessly terrified of danger. Many men and women died in those eras exploring the great unknown. But without their sacrifice, we would never have been able to accomplish what we have.
Apollo 1, The Space Shuttles Challenger and Columbia's losses were all tragic. And I am NOT saying that their loss should be shrugged off as "eh, someone had to die to explore space." What I am saying is that we as humans needed to grow and explore space, much as the Europeans needed to grow and explore beyond their continent. When there was a tragic event in colonial exploration (Jamestown), those people learned from their mistake and tried again and usually succeeded. When we fail today, we usually cower up and shut down all exploration for a half-decade or so.
It's actually a bit sad how Europe is learning from the mistakes made in the United States. A few years ago it was the other way around. Re-inventing the wheel doesn't make driving any safer, and considering the wheel (in this case, the spacesuit) is the LEAST of space travelers' worries, I cannot see our presence in space advancing much further.
Please pay more attention to the intention behind people's language. You should know perfectly well what their use of "3-D clothing" means. It shows that they are designing the structure of the fabric instead of using layers of a single fabric type. Regular T-shirts can be sufficiently described as being "a human shaped roll of 2-D wool" or whatever. While you have found a technical error in their language usage, you would paradoxically have to be a moron to not understand their intention.
-Not bother with creating an account so sue me
ScuttleMonkey posts another Roland Piquepaille story.
gues who's posts come up on a google phrase search on
read more for additional details
Sad that Slashdot keep accepting stories from this spammer, a billion websites with billions of articles and we have to have the same names/spammers/copy&pasters/desperate individuals crap over and over again
no wonder people block adverts here and dont subscribe, try adding value to this site and listening to your potential audience, it might give people an incentive to help this place and donate/unblock ads instead of being teated as fskin idiots ready to lap up whatever shite some shill is pushing (in this case that advert application called ZDNet)
AC
Traditional fabrics are woven in 2 dimensions. Consider cloth a plane, a 2 dimensional entity. It is wrapped about a 3-D body to create a piece of clothing. Cloth is very 2-dimensional.
Instead here the fabrics are being considered in three dimensions from square one - their manufacture is in three directions to provide sweat wicking and other interesting properties.
"Roland Piquepaille writes"... that put me off, right there.
Yes this is a troll. But Roland is an attention whore. It's worth the karma burn.
-- No Sig is a Good Sig
Okay, I was a little harsh. Probably why I never made B/C because I always spoke my mind. However, you never enter a structure without an attack line and any firefighter worth his salt can see a flash-over develop, as I have many times. So, I really don't understand your point or where you are coming from at all. Also, I still say this out the window escape is bogus. Imagine being exhausted, wet leather gloved hand holding a combination tool or pick-headed ax in the corner of a window you just broke, and cleaned of course, and hanging your body weight outside. I'm thinking broken wrist, maybe a silver fork fracture and a fall to the ground. Oh, you said safety rope. Let's see, emanant flash-over, and you have time to break a window, clean the corner of shards, tie a safety rope? I don't think so babe. This might work at the drill tower but this isn't good fireground practice and if I were on your department it would be eliminated.