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NASA Scientists Jubilant After Successful Helicopter Crash
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Elizabeth Barber reports in the Christian Science Monitor that when a CH-46E Sea Knight helicopter plummeted into the ground at more than 30 miles per hour, there was jubilation from the scientists on the ground at the culmination of some two years of preparation to test a helicopter's crashworthiness. 'We designed this test to simulate a severe but survivable crash under both civilian and military requirements,' says NASA lead test engineer Martin Annett. 'It was amazingly complicated with all the planning, dummies, cameras, instrumentation and collaborators, but it went off without any major hitches.' During the crash, high-speed cameras filming at 500 images per second tracked the black dots painted on the helicopter, allowing scientists to assess the exact deformation of each part of the craft, in a photographic technique called full field photogrammetry. Thirteen instrumented crash test dummies and two un-instrumented manikins stood, sat or reclined for a potentially rough ride. The goal of the drop was to test improved seat belts and seats, to collect crashworthiness data and to check out some new test methods but it was also to serve as a baseline for another scheduled test in 2014. 'It's extraordinarily useful information. I will use this information for the next 20 years,' says Lindley Bark, a crash safety engineer at Naval Air Systems Command on hand for the test. 'Even the passenger airplane seats in there were important to us because we fly large aircraft that have the same type of seating."'
They actually do shit with data.
In other news, NASA scientists announced confusion after attempting to crash a helicopter and failing despite repeated tries. The helicopter in question had, in various stages, had its stabilizers, fuel tank and even rotors removed. Despite all this, the helicopter remained aloft. "A failure," one scientist was quoted as saying. "We'll just have to shoot it down and try to crash one next next year after more planning." "A helicopter that cannot crash is a tremendous blow to science," another was heard arguing with another, "How are we supposed to obtain crash data with an infinitely levitating hunk of junk?"
Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Drop testing with the same gantry they've used since the 60's and Apollo. http://www.nasa.gov/centers/langley/news/factsheets/fs-2007-08-138-larc.html
Now named a National Historic Landmark.
It's just you:
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research .
In other news, NASA scientists announced confusion after attempting to crash a helicopter and failing despite repeated tries.
You joke...but this is the sort of thing that never gets funding.
Adam savage tells a tale of how a guy called him after they did the firing bullets inside aircraft episode. He said they'd been trying to get funding to do that experiment for decades.
It also took discovery channel to crash a 'plane and see what happens. There's no way a government could do this...right? (somebody might lose their campaign funding if the results made Boeing look bad!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Boeing_727_crash_experiment
No sig today...
I was under the impression that using airbags without seatbelts would actually cause injuries, mainly due to passengers being bounced around uncontrollably. In a car crash, the head and neck are flung forward by the collision and then back by the airbag rebound, potentially causing whiplash injuries.
If you're wearing a seatbelt, however, it will keep your body stable while the airbag slows your head's travel forward.
Please, correct me if I'm wrong but the two seem to complement each other quite well.