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November/December 2011 Issue Volume 37, Issue 3 AIAA Houston Section www.aiaa-houston.org November / December 2011 Hubble Revisited on NASA’s 50th Anniversary Project Icarus Dr. Richard Obousy, Icarus Interstellar AIAA Houston Section Horizons November / December 2011 Page 1 November / December 2011 T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S (Page numbers are linked on this page. To return here, click on tops of pages.) From the Chair / Our May 18, 2012 Annual Technical Symposium (ATS) 3 HOUSTON From the Editor 4 Horizons is a bimonthly publication of the Houston Section Cover Story: Project Icarus Interstellar 5 of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. The American Astronautical Society (AAS) National Conference in Houston 8 Douglas Yazell Editor Near-Earth Object (NEO) 2005 YU55: A Natural Interplanetary Cycler 10 Past Editors: Dr. Steven E. Everett The 1940 Air Terminal Museum, an AIAA Historic Aerospace Site 13 Editing team: Don Kulba, Ellen Gillespie, Robert Bere- mand 14 Regular contributors: Dr. Steven Everett, Don Kulba, 胜利之吻, “A Successful Kiss”, New Breakthroughs in Chinese Space Philippe Mairet, Alan Simon, Shen Ge, Scott Lowther Lucas, Kepler and Tatooine 16 Contributors this issue: Dr. Richard Obousy, Adrian Mann, Dr. Albert A. Jackson IV, Daniel Adamo, Tom Hile, Use of the International Space Station (ISS) for Exploration 17 Wes Kelly (Triton Systems, LLC) Cosmic Explorations: a Public Lecture Series, by Dr. Bill Bottke 18 AIAA Houston Section Executive Council The Space Lecture Series at UHCL, by Dr. Jeffrey Bennett, Beyond UFOs 22 APR: (1966) LTV’s Universal Hypersonic Test Vehicle 24 Sean Carter Chair The Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) Chapter 12 (Houston) 27 Daniel Nobles Irene Chan Chair-Elect Secretary Current Events (pages 28 & 29) and Staying Informed (pages 30 & 31) 28 Sarah Shull John Kostrzewski Calendar (page 32) and Cranium Cruncher (page 33) 32 Past Chair Treasurer Art by Don Kulba: T-14 Tomcat 34 Julie Read Dr. Satya Pilla Vice-Chair, Operations Vice-Chair, Technical Section News 35 Operations Technical The Back Cover: AAS National Conference in Houston, Nov. 15-16, 2011 36 Dr. Gary Turner Dr. Albert A. Jackson IV Horizons and AIAA Houston Web Site Shen Ge Bebe Kelly-Serrato AIAA National Communications Award Winner Melissa Gordon Dr. Zafar Taqvi Lisa Voiles Bill Atwell Rafael Munoz Sheikh Ahsan Svetlana Hanson William West Michael Frostad Paul Nielson Dr. Benjamin Longmier Dr. Steven E. Everett Matthew Easterly Gary Brown Douglas Yazell Dr. Kamlesh Lulla Gary Cowan Ludmila Dmitriev-Odier Joel Henry 2005 2006 2007 Alan Sisson This newsletter is created by members of the Houston section. Opinions expressed herein other than Councilors by elected Houston section officers belong solely to the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of AIAA or the Houston section. Unless explicitly stated, in no way are the comments of Ellen Gillespie individual contributors to Horizons to be construed as necessarily the opinion or position of AIAA, Brian Banker NASA, its contractors, or any other organization. All articles in Horizons, unless otherwise noted, Matt Johnson are the property of the individual contributors. Reproduction/republishing in any form except lim- Clay Stangle ited excerpts with attribution to the source, will require the express approval of the individual au- Melissa Kronenberger thors. Please address all newsletter correspondence to editor-in-chief “at” aiaa-houston.org. Sarah Barr Donald Barker Shirley Brandt Cover (page 1): Daedalus next to Saturn V. Image credit: Adrian Mann, Holly Feldman www.bisbos.com. Web site for Project Icarus: www.icarusinterstellar.org. Web Gabe Garrett site for the 100 Year Starship study from DARPA and NASA/Ames Research www.aiaa-houston.org Center: www.100yss.org. Dr. Richard Obousy, Icarus Interstellar, gave a presentation at the 100 Year Starship Symposium on 9/30/11. AIAA Houston Section Horizons November / December 2011 Page 2 Table of Contents Page 3 Early Warning Flyer for Our Section’s Annual From the Chair Technical Symposium SEAN CARTER, CHAIR, ELLEN GILLESPIE & DR. SATYA PILLA Above: Sean Carter in 2008 as General Chair of our An- nual Technical Symposium at NASA/JSC. Image credit: Douglas Yazell Sean Carter is generously donating the space for his column this month. Once he starts writing his Chair’s col- umn, we will have trouble limiting him to one page per issue! www.aiaa-houston.org AIAA Houston Section Horizons November / December 2011 Page 3 Page 4 Table of Contents From the Editor Horizons 2011 and 2012 DOUGLAS YAZELL, EDITOR AIAA Houston Section start- 4. Sep / Oct 2011 (36 pgs.) Horizons e-mail publicity ed in 1962, and our newslet- 5. Nov / Dec 2011 (36 pgs.) also goes to our 800+ mem- ter probably started in 1971. bers for each issue, though Jon Berndt was Editor from To add to the confusion, that we probably dropped that ball 2004 to 2007. He created the 1st issue was called “May now and then in the last 3 format we use today. He also 2011”, since it was published years. We also e-mail a pub- led the transition to an online- late on May 17, 2011, and the licity list of non-members only publication, ending our 2nd one was called “June who are interested in our “snail mail” tradition, though 2011.” events. That list probably Horizons’ first online edition includes company contacts. appeared earlier. By June of This low Horizons circulation 2008, Horizons averaged for the last 3 years makes Five or 10 years ago, our 6,000 downloads per issue. “snail mailing” our 800+ Communications Chair Steve Then for more than 2 years, members look good, but we King set up those procedures we had no hit counter. Our are not tempted to return to for publicity for Horizons and current hit counter is for the that successful but old tech- our section events, etc. He newsletter web page, not nology. was followed by Gabe Gar- showing hits per issue. rett, then Matthew Easterly. E-mail: One publicity tool for each Matthew is kindly filling in editor-in-chief “at” Dr. Steven E. Everett was issue of Horizons is NASA’s for that role now, but he an- aiaa-houston.org Editor for 2 years ending “JSC Today” daily e-mail nounced his departure a few June 30, 2010, then I took the note containing event an- months ago. We are seeking a Org chart: reins on April 11, 2011. This nouncements from civil serv- replacement for that and oth- www.aiaa-houston.org. issue is our 5th bimonthly ants and contractors. It goes er positions on our org chart, This web site includes Hori- publication of Horizons since to 3,000 or so civil servants which is visible on page 31 zons back issues to 2005 or that date: and quite a few contractors. and on our web site. earlier. For earlier issues, see 1. Mar/ Apr 2011 (66 pgs.) At the end of each of those the link on our history tech- 2. May / Jun 2011 (90 pgs.) notes, a URL is provided for Until next issue, Happy nical committee’s web page. 3. Jul / Aug 2011 (48 pgs.) the JSC Today archive. Landings! Right: Our only hit counter data since 2008. The data starts on May 29, 2011. Im- age credit: Douglas Yazell Our Horizons archive is https://info.aiaa.org/Regions/ SC/Houston/Newsletters/ Forms/AllItems.aspx. The February 1978 issue is the earliest issue there for now. The February 1987 issue was still called “Newsletter”, and the September 1990 issue is named Horizons. Our archive is not yet complete. We don’t know which issue was the first to be called Horizons. Thanks again to Dr. Larry Friesen for loaning us his copies, which go back to 1978. AIAA Houston Section Horizons November / December 2011 Page 4 Table of Contents Page 5 Project Icarus Icarus Interstellar DR. ALBERT A. JACKSON IV, CHAIR, AIAA HOUSTON SECTION ASTRODYNAMICS TECHNICAL COMMITTEE Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Her- propulsion to life support. starts with an idea, first travel mann Oberth and Robert After WWII the BIS complet- off the Earth. Advances in Goddard (and others) laid the ed this work, all the work the physical sciences inspired AIAA Houston Section astro- early technical groundwork documented in the Journal of Verne and Wells to envision dynamics technical committee for spaceflight, but, as far as I the BIS. (There was an even stories about travel to the web page: know, the first end-to-end further updated version pub- Moon. This led to more spec- http://www.aiaa-houston.org/ integrated space mission de- lished as a book, The Explo- ulations in fiction throughout Astrodynamics.aspx sign was carried out by the ration of the Moon, by Arthur the early 20th century. In- British Interplanetary Society C. Clarke and R.A. Smith in creasingly sophisticated writ- (BIS) 1936 – 1939. This was 1954.) ers, some of whom were a group effort bringing to- physical scientists and engi- gether many disciplines from The history of spaceflight neers, wrote about interplane- tary flight in the literature we now call science fiction Left: Pathfinder Probe prose. (Interstellar Precursor Mis- sion to 1,000 AU - Icarus An increasing accumulation Interstellar Concept Craft), of facts from spaceflight pio- containing 4 large propellant neers, in the areas of propul- tanks. Image credit: Adrian sion and trajectories, finally Mann. became the tipping point of a synthesis. The BIS Moon mission and the Von Braun Das Marsprojekt are exam- ples of a team of technical people assembling all the parts to execute a real mis- (Continued on page 6) Left: Starfinder Probe (Interstellar Precursor Mis- sion to 10,000 AU - Icarus Interstellar Concept Craft), containing 5 large propellant tanks.
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