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One REALLY Long Runway for Rent
DarkNemesis618 writes "NASA is looking into putting its 15,000 foot runway up for rent at the Kennedy Space Center. The runway, which is used for Space Shuttle landings, will soon be used less and less as the Shuttle fleet is set to be retired in 2010. The first private venture was seen last month when Steve Fossett took off at KSC in Virgin Atlantic's experimental plane. One promising deal in the works comes from Zero Gravity Corp. which offers customers a few seconds of weightlessness on a Boeing 727-200. The shuttle runway, built in the 1970s never got the use it was expected to, and with the next generation of space vehicles using parachutes to land, the runway is going to have even less use."
They should smash it and auction off the pieces. It'd probably pay for itself.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Perhaps a bunch of us could get together, and rent it out once a year -- ala Burningman, Xday, and the like. Perhaps us Science geeks, and Sci-Fi freaks could show-up for a weekend of partying, to celebrate spacetravel, and the persuits to get there. Me, I just want another excuse to party.
Zhrodague.net - I do projects and stuff too.
Who's up for getting a '75 Chevy Nova and some RATO packs!
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
15 thousand 0 0 0 feet. How long does....
Maybe with a runway that size I could actually land on it. Heck, all runways should be that long, so that planes won't "overshoot" the runway like you see in the news.
x86, oh yes, I'm pro.
hopscotch tournament?
I know you want to.
They finally have a facility long enough to test their anti-lock braking systems.
15 000 feet = 4 572 meter
I don't know how close this runway is to the place for which the new parachute based shuttles will be landing or how close it is to the launch pad, but why not give it back to the tax papers and open it up as a place for the public to observe launches/takeoffs?
-- Jim http://www.runfatboy.net/
Maybe they could use it for landing tests for Aurora,
Blackstar, Brilliant Buzzard, Fastmover and all kinds
of secret and non-existent airplanes.
Looks like a new playground for it has opened up!
Alien landing strip.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I remember when i was younger the excitement of thinking that with the shuttles the potential of space flight would only grow from point on. The pure simple idea that pretty much in my life time there would come a time when space flight would become routine. When there would be a spacecraft lifting off once or even twice in the same week.
Unfortunately the shuttles never got there. The reasons are many and varied, and ultimately stupid. The ramp up the potential never happened. I can remember a time when NASA was considering the possibility of many many more shuttles.
Its sad really.
We (humanity as a whole) should by now have a much greater presense in space. The technology should have advanced to a far greater state than it has at time time. We are pretty much still stuck in the same place as we were in the late 1970's. The shuttles tech has seen little change from the 1970's tech that was in place when they were first drawn up.
The really comical part is at this point we are planning to more forward, by going backwards to tech that predates the shuttle program. Admittedly the shuttles didn't work out, they were probably to for4ward thinking when they were first developed. We are now in a place where we do not have the time, or perhaps even the desire to back to the drawing board and bring to bear the full weight of out current technology.
The End result we will continue in space, however it will continue as a lackluster effort.
Power Corrupts,Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, leaving one person(group)in charge is absolutely corrupt.
They could easily do a flying mile competition there and not have to shut and public roadways down.
For those that don't know about One Lap, it's an automotive competition where they go from locations to location testing their vehicles in different ways. In the end, all the scores are added up and they are placed according to an average of all competitions. Web site -- http://www.onelapofamerica.com/
Along similar lines, I reckon that NASA should sell advertising space on the side of launch vehicles, etc, to help cover costs of launch. How much would (e.g.) McDonalds be willing to pay for a frickin' huge yellow 'M' on the side of a rocket? I'd bet a million or three $'s, at least. (After all, companies pay millions for 30s during superbowl commercials...) To a small science mission on a budget of a couple of hundred million, this would be a really big deal, IMO.
Just my 2c...
After reading the headline, I'm really glad this wasn't a Christina Aguilera story.
Google Maps link
You could fit a lot of astronomers, their RVs and vendors on that strip. The light pollution wouldn't be too bad there either since it's not in the center of the Cape.
Sounds like something the MythBusters would really love!
I wonder if the Mythbusters could afford to rent it for a month or so.
I'm sure there's something cool that Adam & Jamie could test there.
Something dangerous.
Dubai would be interested in purchasing the runway for Al-Qaeda Airlines.
Feloniously as always from an undisclosed, secure crashcart,
President-Vice Richard B. Cheney
Nearly three miles of empty pavement sounds like a lot of (pretty safe) fun.
Pick One: http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~stremler/sigs/sigs.html (Note - disable Javascript first!)
This would be awesome to fly at. Considering so many clubs are being closed due to urban encroachment and noise they should allow R/C airplanes on this runway a couple of days a week. I know - but just dreaming....
Despite being one really huge runway there is something else I learned while visiting the Kennedy Space Center. The entire runway complete in a single pouring Essentially it is one gigantic slab of concrete with no cracks in it.
I went to Nazca, Peru last year, and some of those runways for alien spacecraft are way longer! Don't any of you watch the X-files!
I'll be honest with you. I need a 15,000 ft runway, and I need it today. But this just isn't what I'm looking for.
What do you mean? It's a runway.
Well, it is and it ain't...
could you translate it into a more usable measurement? Say... VW beetles or US Capitol buildings? Thanks.
-Nis
Excellent for top speed time trials... indeed.
MadOgre.com
Commercial Use of Shuttle Landing Facilities Planned
Who wants to see drags strip?
Maybe they'll have a lot more up for rent/sale without the funding to use it after their recent heavy budget slashing from the current administration.
There is precedent for converting it into a drag racing strip. RAF Podington, a USAAF airfield in WWII, home of the 92nd Bomb Group with their B-17 bombers, was converted after the war into the Santa Pod drag strip, now the most famous drag strip in the U.K.
From NASA: http://www-pao.ksc.nasa.gov/kscpao/nasafact/landin gfac.htm
Whenever the offence inspires less horror than the punishment, the rigour of penal law is obliged to give way...
... than underused shuttle facilities at KSC is the Air Force shuttle facility on the west coast, which cost $6 billion, and was never used at all.
Because if Virgin Atlantic have bought SS1-derived spaceplanes, then there's an opportunity for a hell of a fast trip to Europe. There's a runway in Spain capable of taking the Space Shuttle; though it's never been used, it's a factor in various abort scenarios.
Lifting off from Canaveral in a SpaceShip 2 and landing in Spain would make the old Concorde record time look pretty pathetic.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Remind me to never fly into Quebec!
Anything that actually uses the pads isn't a U FO.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Courtesy of Google Maps:v eral,+fl&ll=28.613987,-80.691404&spn=0.048524,0.10 849&t=k
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=cape+cana
Finally the government operating a natural role as the infrastructure monopoly investing in the startup of private American industry. NASA overall has produced probably the best ROI on any US government investment in the 20th Century. And the US space industry is at the crossroads for going live, both positioned to deliver services and facing foreign competition.
Let's spend hundreds of billions of the dollars that we currently mostly waste on Pentagon corporate welfare that makes the US feared around the world instead spent on NASA investment in infrastructure to support private corporations. Let's get the US aerospace industry to compete by raising private investment to fund competitions for achieving goals like Lunar power stations and manned Martian research bases. Let's get NASA to become solely a policy, design, testing and certification agency, and subsidize American corporations to pass our highest criteria ahead of foreign ones.
Let's take it to the stars!
--
make install -not war
... but google earths measure tool lets you see what 15000ft across your neck of the woods looks like. Its likely to be quite a lot further than you think. Si
The speeds they could reach on a circuit like that would be hair-raising, the overtaking opportunities would be superb, and you'd be able to get more spectators in. If NASA got a percent cut on the ticket sales, they'd be able to fund all of their real work, and so everyone would be happy.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
My wife always says width matters.
SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAYYY!!!
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KTTS "NASA Shuttle Landing Facility" details here:
Runway Information
Runway 15/33
Dimensions: 15000 x 300 ft. / 4572 x 91 m
Surface: concrete/grooved, in good condition
Weight bearing capacity:
Single wheel: 120000 lbs
Double wheel: 220000 lbs
Double tandem: 500000 lbs
Dual double tandem: 800000 lbs
Runway edge lights: non-standard
NSTD HIRL; 85' FR RWY EDGE.
RUNWAY 15 RUNWAY 33
Gradient: 0.0 0.0
Traffic pattern: left left
Markings: precision, in good condition precision, in good condition
Approach lights: ALSF2: standard 2,400 foot high intensity approach lighting system with centerline sequenced flashers (category II or III) ALSF2: standard 2,400 foot high intensity approach lighting system with centerline sequenced flashers (category II or III)
Centerline lights: yes
CL RWY 15-33 NSTD, 10,000'. yes
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cribbed from airnav.com [sweet site]
-- Experience is a wonderful thing. It enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.
Along with it being 15000 feet long and 300 ft wide, the shuttle runway has other special characteristics. For example, the surface roughness is so great that it can handle an incredible amount of rain (~4 inches per hour, IIRC) before requiring a landing scrub due to a hydroplaning landing. Of course, the Shuttle can't handle rain anyways, since it would damage those cursed tiles. The result is that the really really expensive Shuttle tires are replaced after every landing because so much rubber is worn away.
Also, the macroscopic flatness (ie: delta elevation/foot of runway) is an order of magnitude better than typical airport runways.
If you ever get the chance to have an escorted tour around the Johnson Space Center (students: find alumni working there!), make sure to check out the test landing strip there. It is beyond cool. They accelerate a multi-ton carriage at 30 g's to simulate a landing... and then dump copious amounts of water in front of it.
IWARS.
People, in general, disappoint me. Politicians even more so.
Humans need to concentrate on fixing our problems down here on planet earth before more money is spent on space.
Some people say that the space program has helped every day life on earth - but all I see are a bunch of non-bio degradable, non-renewable materials.
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Insert joke here ...
--- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
That's what they want you to think!
It has nothing to do with the length of the runway, but more, the location of it. The nearer you are to the equator, the easier it is to leave for orbit... You're already moving faster near the equator than farther North (or South). Being in Florida, it's closer than both Chicago's and NY's airports.
There's also this little thing with consistent weather -- well, outside of the ocasional hurricane.
Oh, do you mean, like this?
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/30263
I have a couple of ideas that the runway could be used for.
World's largest LAN PARTY!!!! (Geeks actually OUTSIDE exposed to SunLight!)
RC Car Racing!
Once again, NASA screwed up putting all of its eggs in one basket. The shuttle should be scrapped, dig a big hole, buried and forgotten. The return to expendable launch vehicles will hopefully put NASA back on some sort of track. The 15,000 foot runway is just another example of NASA/government spending out of control.
I'd like to go and do about a dozen touch and goes without having to turn.
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
I'm being serious, and yes, most F1 racetracks are old airfields.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
in Top Gun. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Gun_(video_game)
... to run a 5k! I imagine it's much easier to plan a race event around the very rare shuttle landings rather than blocking traffic and having runners run in circles around city blocks or something. Maybe they could have a shorter race, a 4.5k, as a special KSC event. Call it "The Space Race".
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3 words: "Vincent Black Lightning"
m otors.html :)
http://www.motorcycledaily.com/15october02vincent
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Of course, the disaster was caused by the rocket launching to early :/
"When the atomic bomb goes off there's devastation...but when the atomic bong goes off there's celebraaaaation!"
The former Wurthsmith AFB (now Oscoda-Wursmith Airport) has an 11,800 ft (3,597m) runway. It was previously used for B-52s and KC-135s, and now hosts some cargo and refurbishing air traffic.
Anyways, I have seen some engineers using the runway to test C6-R Corvettes. I would guess they worked for a private team, since GM has test facilities. Every once and awhile a fire truck and ambulance would park near the runway and a car would come out do a few passes down the runway.
...for the Shagohod! If only Snake hadn't blown the dang thing up.
I smell driving school.
I don't think it's THAT kind of runway...
I think it's the kind for airplanes (and spaceplanes).
Why is it that guys are so obsessed with size?
If you look at the first few dozen posts, it's all about who's runway is the longest and whose is the widest.
And how many "touch and go's" one can perform down the length of it?
I used to land at this airport with only had a 4,000 ft runway, and I'm telling you...
I'll take a guy with short runway who knows how to use it over a guy with 15,000 ft runway anyday!
Actually, it seems that a V8 conversion can actually weigh LESS than the stock Rotary twin turbo setup.
Check out: http://www.hinsonsupercars.com/FAQ.htm
Admittedly their website sucks but they have some interesting information on there. The old iron SBC 350 was a heavy engine but the new LS family definatly is not. This is something that I would like to attempt in the future; it seems like it would be an neat car from a performance standpoint. I love the 3rd gen RX7, as well as the concept of the Rotary, but I'm scared of the engine reliablity issues.
And as you tread the halls of sanity, You feel so glad to be, Unable to go beyond. I have a message, From another time..
I say bring back the chicane-free long straights! Hell, if they can get enough armco barrier, bring back the Old Nurenbergring! The race where Senna and Prost went the length of the start-finish straight less than an inch apart at 220MPH+ should be required viewing for all new drivers.
Motor racing has become a circus, with cars parading round like motorized elephants. Sure, keep it reasonably safe. But it's senseless to sterilize it. Jackie Stewart is of the opinion that F1 is actually more dangerous (and more boring) because of all the safety - that the element of danger made drivers far more aware and far more skilled in their actions. I agree - well, mostly. (I see no reason to deliberately make either a car or a track unsafer than necessary, but I believe that leaves plenty of scope for exciting, high-speed, wheel-to-wheel racing.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I haven't looked up any references, so the figures are off the top of my head, but keep in mind that the Space Shuttle lands at roughly twice the speed of the fastest commercial airliner. The shuttle, as I recall, lands at somewhere in the neighborhood of 300 mph, whereas most Boeings and Airbuses float over the threshold at no more than 150 mph. Someone pickier than me will post the actual numbers. But my point is that such a dramatically higher landing speed requires a lot longer runway.
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