SCRIW

This weekend The Hitchhikers attended the first annual South Carolina Robotics Invitational and Workshops. I was able to convince the team to go after all the fun that I had at TNT last month. I volunteered to ref the event to get more experience before next season. After the long drive down Friday night, including a stop at FU to visit Lauren, we were all up before 7 so we could arrive at the venue right around when it opened at 7:30.
After we got to Columbia High School and got all settled in I went to go check out the field and was told by the event organizers that the SC/NC head ref, Terrell, who was coming to SCRIW to head ref was at a Lego League event and wasn't going to be in until the afternoon and until then I would be filling in as head ref. Naturally I accepted and got to train the rest of the refs and scorekeepers. Overall the event went really well and I once again really enjoyed being on the field crew. Even when Terrell arrived just near the end of qualifying he was cool with letting me continue to head ref and was more than happy to help.
Getting to see how another offseason event, besides TNT, is run was interesting especially since I am trying to put together an offseason event in North Carolina. It also showed how spoiled we are at TNT, not that SCRIW was badly run because it wasn't. At SCRIW the AndyMark guys were running the field and the rest of field crew was a bit shorthanded, while at TNT Krunch basically supplies the entire field crew made up of alumni and mentors. It showed me that not only do you need enough teams but you also need volunteers and hopefully North Carolina has them.
As for team 2059, we went 2-4 was seeded 17th and 17 and was not selected for elimination. It wasn't really that disappointing to me because I was working, what I was really disappointed about was the fact that we seemed to have the same problems, with the robot and the team, which we had at North Carolina. Despite having a bunch of new students and 6 months to work on the robot we still aren't up to our potential. Hopefully we can correct these problems and get the team firing on all cylinders by January.

Atomic Bomb Dismantled

Yesterday workers in Amarillo, Texas removed the uranium from the last B53 nuclear bomb. This marks a huge moment for this country because the B53 were the largest nuclear bombs ever created by the United States. The B53 which is the size of a minivan weighed in at around 5 tons and was 600 times more powerful then the atomic bomb that killed 140,000 people in Hiroshima, Japan. The size was due to the inaccuracies of older nuclear bomb, newer bombs are smaller but they are also better aimed to reduce collateral damage.

While the nuclear bomb was one of the most deadly technological advances of all time the science behind it cannot be ignored. Before nuclear bombs were created near the end of World War II nuclear reactions were completely unknown to the world. Through the development of nuclear bombs like the B53 we have been able to harness the power of nuclear reactions for electricity which releases less pollution then standard coal-fired power plants.

The dismantling of the bomb is part of the United States larger effort to reduce and possibly eliminate all nuclear weapons throughout the world. The two countries with the largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons, the United States and Russia, built most of them during the arm race that was the Cold War. The rest of the countries that have nuclear weapons recieved the technology from one of the original two countries. The UN has been trying to reduce the number of nuclear weapons and hopefully the START treaty that the US and Russia signed will lead these countries to reduce their nuclear stockpile as well.
For a list of state with nuclear weapons click this link.

High-Speed Rail

During the late 1800s if you wanted to travel long distances trains were the way to go. Trains helped to shape the United States and make it what it is today. With the invention of air travel, which was much faster, trains fell out of favor and mainly served to transport cargo. The combination of rising gas prices and the recent recession have seen a rebirth of travel by railroad. Amtrak has shown record ridership over the last year and is looking to expand routes.

The other type of rail travel that has been gaining steam is high-speed rail. Basically high-speed rail is just the same as normal passenger rail except that the trains travel an upward of 200 mph compared to 60-80 mph. It has caught on in Europe and Japan because of the proximity of large cities in those two areas. Trying to recreate that success in the United States the Obama administration identified 10 high-speed rail corridors ranging from the California corridor to the Empire corridor. Both my hometown of Tampa and my current city, Raleigh, were featured in potential corridors. Tampa, as part of the Florida corridor, recently had the high-speed rail cancelled because of potential cost overruns. Raleigh, as part of the Southeast corridor, is still working on the rail route from Richmond. While high speed rail is really interesting and I have always been a big train fan, I just don't see the potential reward for the cost unless there is already a route between the two planned locations.

Tempest 'n' Tampa 2011

After a one year break Tempest 'n' Tampa(TNT) returned with a new venue and of course a new game. Now that I'm an alumni/mentor I came back and volunteered as a referee. This was the first event that I have ever reffed at so I was a new experience for me. Overall I thought it went very well and was a lot of fun. Plus I got to ref with a couple of my good friends, Bryan Gallo and Michelle Hawley, plus head ref Alex Sims and Gabe Salas which made it all the more fun.
Other than calling penalties, disabling towers, and handing out red cards TNT featured it's trademark lock-in Friday night. Most of the games are reserved for the team but I as well as the rest of "Team Staff" got to demonstrate a couple of the games and compete in human LogoMotion and Oink, Oink, Boom. The only problem with the lock-in was the fact that I got like 3 and a half hours of sleep and I had to ref all day Saturday.
As for the competition, congrats to 233, 744 and 665 on winning TNT and to 801, 1592 and 1251 for 2 hard fought finals matches even though 1251 lost their CRIO power cables. For 233 and 744 winning an event once is pretty impressive but to win the same event 3 out 4 years is incredible.
In conclusion despite taking a year off TNT was just as good as ever and I was awesome getting to spend some time with my robotics friends that are at college, Bryan, Michelle, Jonell, Will, Lauren, Cat, Alex and anyone else I forgot.

This Week in Fantasy: Week 1

This is a new feature that I will be posting every week during football season. Basically I will go over the past weekend's football specifically focusing on fantasy. This year I am playing in two fantasy football leagues. The first one is the Shimberg Fantasy Football League which is made up almost exclusively of family member and I have been playing in for 6 or 7 years. New to the fantasy plate this year is The League which is one by one of my friends. I am mainly going to focus on the SFFL only going over my game score and current standings from The League.

Shimberg Fantasy Football League:
Jacob's Jaguars(Jacob): 146.9
Josh Freeman's Jew Fros: 120.88

Connor's Champs: 160.16
Chase's Stone Crabs: 151.98

I am a certified lifeguard: 122.92
Rhett's Rebels: 116.06

Jared's Juicers: 115.72
Andrew's Armadillos: 98.98

Wyatt's Winners: 113.0
Kyle's Kryptonite: 115.46

City Attorney's Legal Eagles: 89.18
O-bro's Hobos: 49.96

For the week I had the 2nd highest point total 14 less than Connor's Champs. My top scorers were Kenny Britt who had 42.6 with 136 rec yards and 2 TDs and Philip Rivers who had 335 yards passing 2 TDs and 2 INTs. Right now I am tied for 1st place in division 1 with Connor and i am a certified lifeguard.

The League:
Yoda's Jedis(Jacob): 102.96
Griffins: 64.48

For the week I had the fifth highest score and my top scorers were Josh Freeman with 17.56 and Reggie Wayne with 16.6. As in the SFFL I am tied for first place in the standings.

Future of Outer Space Exploration: Part 2

In part 1 I talked only about the United States, in part 2 I am going to focus on other countries. The countries that will be profiled are Russia, the European Space Agency, China, and Japan.
Russia:
Currently Russia is the only country that participated in the ISS program operating manned spacecraft, Soyuz, which was developed by the former Soviet Union to take men to the moon. First tested in 1966 the Soyuz spacecraft has operated 110 flights over the last 45 years. The current Soyuz-TMA has been improved and modified many time since the original Soyuz A. On top of the Soyuz the Russians also operate the Progress unmanned cargo spacecraft. For all intents and purposes it is a modified Soyuz that is designed to get carry cargo and burn up in the atmosphere during reentry. Currently Russia is working on developing a new manned spacecraft, Rus, that would replace the Soyuz. A design has not yet been decided on, but when one is it will probably 3-4 years before a manned version is ready to launch.
European Space Agency:
The ESA is made up of 19 European countries and Canada and mainly focuses on satellite launches with their Ariane 5 rocket. The ESA has also launch two Automated Transfer Vehicles which are similar to the Progress but three times larger. Three more launches are planned at 17 month intervals. As for manned spacecraft the ESA is looking info modifying the ATV to handle a crew three for ISS crew missions and potentially a mission to Mars.
Japan:
Japan's only spacecraft is the unmanned H-II Tranfer Vehicle which has been launched twice in the last three years. The HTV is used to resupply Japan's Kibo modules on the ISS. Kibo is made up of three modules and makes Japan's contribution the third largest after the United States and Russia. Japan has made no progress when it comes to manned space flight but they hope to have a lunar mission ready to fly by 2020.
China:
China is currently operating manned and unmanned spacecraft. The manned spacecraft Shenzhou has launch 7 total mission with three of them being manned. More missions are planned including docking Tiangong 1 space station which should launch sometime soon. Two larger space stations are also planned as is a lunar mission by the end of decade.

It may look like a lot of countries space programs especially China are moving ahead of the United States now that the Space Shuttles are retired. What I think is happening is that all of the Space Agencies are going through the same trial and tribulations that we went through during the space race of the 1960s. Our space program has been flying for almost 50 years and has developed more types of spacecraft than anybody including the only reusable spacecraft ever. There is no real need to worry because we are closer to having craft ready to go the moon than anybody.

Future of Outer Space Exploration: Part 1

In class on Wednesday we began discussing Angle of Attack and the topic was brought up about whats next for NASA and space travel now that the Space Shuttles have been retired. From the brief comments that were made in class it became apparent to me that NASA has been flying well under the radar with what it is up to. This is the complete opposite from how all of the programs in NASA's history have been operated with tons of media coverage throughout the programs.
With the last Shuttle flight completed and the cancellation of Constellation program the future of NASA is up in the air. NASA is right now working on developing a heavy lifting Space Launch System to eventually fly to near Earth Asteroids and Mars. What will fly on top of that launch system is another major shift in NASA's policy, a reliance on commercial companies to build and operate rockets and spacecraft. I made a mention of this in my post about the launch failure of the Russian Progress spacecraft, here. One of the two companies that won contracts for NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services, COTS, Space X was briefly mentioned, but right now I want to talk a little about the other company, Orbital Science and their Tauras II rocket and Cygnus spacecraft.
Orbital Science, normally called Orbital, was founded in the early 1980s and mainly focused on launching satellites. In 2008 they began to develop the Tauras II rocket and unmanned Cygnus spacecraft to fly 8 cargo missions to the ISS. The first Tauras II flight was originally going to take place in 2010 but has been postponed until at least the fourth quarter of 2011.
The other company that won a COTS contract with NASA was Space X out of Hawthorne, CA. Space X uses a Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft to complete their missions to the ISS. As part of their 12 cargo flight contract Space X has to fly 2 test flights to the ISS to test out all of the systems of the spacecraft. The second of those two flights with launch in November and if everything goes well the first private unmanned cargo flight to the ISS will take place next year. On top of that crewed Dragon capsules should be ready to test in a year of two.
As for Mars NASA is working with Space X to get a Dragon and new Falcon 9 Heavy rocket for a low-cost mission to Mars that would launch by the end of decade.
So far I have only talked about cargo and ISS crew flights and have made no mention of private sub-orbital and orbital space planes like the Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo. Most of these planes are not yet spacecraft because they are not designed to leave the atmosphere. Virgin is looking to start flights next year and soon anyone will be able to go into space.
Part 1 has focused on the future of United States space travel, part 2 which should come either tonight or tomorrow will focus on what other countries are doing when it comes to space travel.