It has been interesting to connect my closeup observation of “Jet Pack” fliers with my thoughts about Lunar Landings. (The “Rocket Man” was taking off just the other side of the fence from us at the “X PRIZE Cup event, 2006.) The roughly 22 seconds of flight available with a “Jet Pack” stretches to about 180 seconds on the Moon (at 1/6 G thrust, and assuming a 35% increase in ISP working into a vacuum.) What these skilled fliers do exceeded my expectations for what is humanly possible, in a difficult control environment! (Flying these is NOT EASY and involves a lot of cautious training!)

On the Moon, the control actions are effectively in slow motion, and much less demanding. The total energy and momentum involved do not, however, diminish and even greater caution is necessary. Good altitude and velocity measurements are highly desirable, since at the greater altitudes attainable, operation is less “instinctive”. Using ½ the fuel for lift off, vertical velocity can approach 150 meters per second, and reach 6,750 meters ( 22,000 feet) altitude or reach 13.5 km horizontal distance with optimally angled flight! (Both numbers are reduced by “gravity loss” with practical thrust values.) These calculations assume that ½ of the usable fuel is saved for landing (plus all of the normal 10% reserve for safety) since the 150 meter per second landing velocity represents a 1100 meter (3,300 foot) free fall on Earth, without the assistance of air drag!

But this is only the performance using the same “Jet Pack”! A practical limitation on Earth, is the mass of the unit strapped onto a flier's back. The standard system masses 50 to 60 pounds with full fuel. This reduces to 10 pounds weight on the Moon, added to the flier's 30 pound lunar weight. Keeping in mind that the flier's legs are not able to absorb much more momentum or energy on the Moon, with care, a user can handle much greater total backpack mass. A modest increase in fuel ISP can also be arranged, since 90% Hydrogen Peroxide monopropellant is far from the best obtainable storable propellant. Doubling the Delta V available quadruples the obtainable altitude and distance, giving 54 km distance for a single hop. The back pack could still “weigh” only 15 pounds (90 pounds mass). Gone are thoughts of Lunar Explorers slowly plodding over the surface to return from from an excursion!

I have just begun visualizing how this could change lunar operations, so I won't pursue those thoughts now. But consider that lightweight systems with a fueled mass equal to the suited astronaut's (about 100 kg (220 pounds) added to his suited 100 kg (220 pounds)), could allow him to achieve orbit, and rendezvous personally with a lunar orbit habitat. The weight on his legs, preparing to take off, would still be only 33 kg (73 pounds)!

Keeping in mind the astronaut's need to manage two and a half times his normal mass (and the greater resulting inertia with every motion), it is obvious that a he could also land with that mass on his back. Again, noting the “Rocket Man's” ability to conduct precision landings on Earth with three times that weight on his legs (landing just after takeoff, with nearly full fuel still in his backpack) – and without the “slow motion” - factor of 2.45 increase in time available for each flight adjustment at 1/6 G - it is obvious that this would be a very practical way to get astronauts down onto the Moon with their full orbital return equipment strapped on.

Space microscope for weather ballon experiment finished

This past week Jason Dunn, Chief Engineer for Omega Envoy, and Tapan Kulkarni, GNC Lead for Omega Envoy, attended the American Aeronautical Society's GNC conference in Breckenridge, Colorado to present a paper on the GNC Challenges for the Omega Envoy mission. In the paper several mission scenarios were presented which revealed our strategy for choosing the planned mission design to put our rover, Sagan, on the lunar surface. The paper also identifies the key GNC challenges that the mission will face.

Future work will build off the mission design with more rigorous STK simulations incorporating the spacecraft CAD models and other geometric properties.

A pdf version of the paper may be downloaded here.

Dan Jenkins has created a new Google Lunar X PRIZE mission animation for us. Enjoy!

Watch in high definition.

I have just started the return trip from California from the Google Lunar X PRIZE Team Summit. The trip is long, of course, and with the time difference it feels longer! Starting from California in the morning, arriving the day after in the afternoon!.

All in all the meeting went well, and it was interesting to meet the GLXP people and the Teams again. There are some great folks here, all with the same passion for space and space exploration.

The GLPX Team certainly listened to the views of the Teams, and did what they could in order to accommodate the comments. Of course we did not expect all comments to be taken on board, also because the Teams have different views and realities.

The two main "sticky" points for our team relates to "waivers" and to insurance coverage. Here the traditions in Europe and in the US are so different, that it becomes a problem. I do not yet know if a solution can be found. Time will tell.

On the more positive side, there is broad consensus on the technical issues and now also on the media issues.

The visit to Nasa's Jet Propulsion Lab was great, they have very good facilities, and their support was very much appreciated.

During the meeting I also talked to a lot of the participants, among them, Randa from Interorbital Systems. Randa is in the process of testing an orbits rocket, and is planning the first orbital launch in December 2010. That time frame could fit us very well for a test launch, to check out par of our equipment under space conditions, and to get the ground segment set up. We will surely talk more with her about the detailed options.

Last weeks announcement of the proposed NASA budget, dropping human spaceflight as one of NASA's responsibilities, has caused some to doubt that we Americans can keep up, that we will step up to the challenge of commercializing human spaceflight. First of all, dispite perceptions to the contrary, all American spaceflight has always been carried out by commercial companies. NASA has never built a single man-rated spacecraft. All this strange talk about private industry not being able to build certified man-rated rockets is part of that strange perception that NASA built our man-rated spacecraft. They did not, private companies built every one of them, from the Mercury capsules to the space shuttles.

Last year the Space Frontiers Foundation co- sponsored a contest, asking the question, What Should the Future of American Human Spaceflight Be? Our team entered three video responses to this contest. This was one of the prize winners:

Randa Milliron, Interorbital Systems CEO and CoFounder/ SYNERGY MOON's Launch Provider, comments on Space Shuttle Program demise:
http://www.technewsworld.com/rsstory/69294.html

Our partners at Veliky Novgorod State University's Laboratory of
Innovative Radio Systems have developed an alpha version of Moon rover
software.

This computer vision software interfaces with dual cameras for
stereovision as well as a laser scanning tool for obstacle detection. It
will help our rover travel autonomously on the lunar surface.

In the near future, we plan to equip our rover with additional sensors
including an accelerometer, and inclinometers along with an odometer to
accurately measure how far our rover travels.

http://picasaweb.google.com/selenokhod/RoverPrototype2#

The ground floor of the new Gates-Hillman Center for Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon is devoted to the 5,000 square foot Planetary Robotics Lab. The PRL includes a 3,000 square foot high bay with computer controlled crane for engineering and experimentation, along with workrooms for fabrication of robots and their components.

While the Gates-Hillman building was opened for most uses in fall 2009, move-in to the PRL took place last week as the last of the construction company gear and furniture staging areas cleared out.

With the Super Bowl coming up tomorrow White Label Space did a quick check on the price that advertisers are paying this year for a 30 second timeslot during one of the most watched sporting events in the world. According to this CBS news piece, the answer is $3 million. (Note also the interesting discussion about trademark ownership at the end of the news piece.)

Wow! It costs $1 million per 10 seconds of Super Bowl air time.

Now, our team's cost engineers have predicted that our Google Lunar X PRIZE mission will cost around $50 million. That's equal to 500 seconds (8.3 minutes) of Super Bowl ad time, or about 17 standard length ads.

Of course, just like the Super Bowl and other high profile international competitions, our Mooncasts will clearly show the logos of our sponsors on our Rover and Lander as they go about their business on the field of play.

May the best team win!