Thought this was cool enough to pass along
Helicopter Stunt Pilots to Snag Stardust for NASA
By Gina Keating, Reuters
PASADENA, Calif. (Aug. 19) -- NASA has recruited two Hollywood helicopter stunt pilots for an especially tricky maneuver -- snagging a capsule full of stardust as it parachutes back to Earth next month, mission managers said on Thursday.
Reuters
Dan Rudert is one of the two helicopter pilots involved in the Genesis spacecraft mission.
The mid-air retrieval 4,000 feet above the Utah desert on Sept. 8 is the planned climax to the space agency's $264 million Genesis mission, which began three years ago with the launch of a space probe to collect tiny charged particles called ions blown toward Earth from the sun.
Scientists say the resulting cargo of solar ions, about 10 to 20 micrograms of oxygen, nitrogen and other elements that collectively weigh about as much as a few grains of salt, will yield key insights about the formation of planets at the dawn of the solar system.
The novel scheme for snaring the re-entry capsule, thus sparing the canister from a rocky landing that could damage the delicate instruments and samples inside, was unveiled for reporters on Thursday at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
The return of the Genesis probe will mark the first bits of extraterrestrial matter retrieved from space by human means since the 1970s, when moon rocks were carried back to Earth by manned U.S. Apollo and unmanned Soviet Luna missions, NASA said.
If successful, it also will make aviation history as the first man-made object captured by aircraft as it entered Earth's atmosphere from space, said Roy Haggard, an aerospace research executive hired by NASA to design the Genesis retrieval project.
He said helicopters were used in thousands of missions to grab parachuted canisters of film shot by spy cameras over Vietnam and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
But in recruiting personnel for Genesis, Haggard said all the experts kept pointing to stunt pilots as the best suited for the job.
In the end, he hired Cliff Fleming as his chief pilot for the Genesis project and backup Dan Rudert, both leading Hollywood stunt pilots who also fly firefighting missions for the government.
Fleming, who previously flew for the military, is currently on the set of the next "Batman" movie and did not attend the press event. But Rudert, whose stunt credits include "Hulk" and "XXX," said the precision flying they do for film work is good training.
"A lot of the stuff we do is close, and that does help us," he said.
The disc-shaped reentry capsule, about 5 feet wide and weighing about 450 pounds, will enter the atmosphere at a speed of 24,600 miles per hour.
But once its parachute is deployed, the pod will slow to just over 20 mph, dropping at 14 feet per second, by the time it reaches its "intercept point" about 4,000 feet over the desert floor, NASA said.
The two retrieval copters, each carrying a three-person crew and hovering several miles away from the target area, will swoop in once they spot the parachute, which also will be tracked by radar. The object is for Fleming to snag the chute with a special 20-foot-long hook.
If he misses, he and Rudert will have time to make about 10 passes before the capsule drops to 500 feet, too low for a safe mid-air grab. But Haggard said the pilots successfully hooked the capsule in all 60 of their practice runs.
Once the pod is snagged, it will be flown to a temporary landing spot, where it will be lowered onto a pad, disconnected from its parachute and flown to a nearby Army air field to be lowered gently into a special cradle and then moved into an isolation chamber, NASA said.
08/19/04 18:28 ET
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040819183109990003
Helicopter Stunt Pilots to Snag Stardust for NASA
By Gina Keating, Reuters
PASADENA, Calif. (Aug. 19) -- NASA has recruited two Hollywood helicopter stunt pilots for an especially tricky maneuver -- snagging a capsule full of stardust as it parachutes back to Earth next month, mission managers said on Thursday.
Reuters
Dan Rudert is one of the two helicopter pilots involved in the Genesis spacecraft mission.
The mid-air retrieval 4,000 feet above the Utah desert on Sept. 8 is the planned climax to the space agency's $264 million Genesis mission, which began three years ago with the launch of a space probe to collect tiny charged particles called ions blown toward Earth from the sun.
Scientists say the resulting cargo of solar ions, about 10 to 20 micrograms of oxygen, nitrogen and other elements that collectively weigh about as much as a few grains of salt, will yield key insights about the formation of planets at the dawn of the solar system.
The novel scheme for snaring the re-entry capsule, thus sparing the canister from a rocky landing that could damage the delicate instruments and samples inside, was unveiled for reporters on Thursday at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
The return of the Genesis probe will mark the first bits of extraterrestrial matter retrieved from space by human means since the 1970s, when moon rocks were carried back to Earth by manned U.S. Apollo and unmanned Soviet Luna missions, NASA said.
If successful, it also will make aviation history as the first man-made object captured by aircraft as it entered Earth's atmosphere from space, said Roy Haggard, an aerospace research executive hired by NASA to design the Genesis retrieval project.
He said helicopters were used in thousands of missions to grab parachuted canisters of film shot by spy cameras over Vietnam and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
But in recruiting personnel for Genesis, Haggard said all the experts kept pointing to stunt pilots as the best suited for the job.
In the end, he hired Cliff Fleming as his chief pilot for the Genesis project and backup Dan Rudert, both leading Hollywood stunt pilots who also fly firefighting missions for the government.
Fleming, who previously flew for the military, is currently on the set of the next "Batman" movie and did not attend the press event. But Rudert, whose stunt credits include "Hulk" and "XXX," said the precision flying they do for film work is good training.
"A lot of the stuff we do is close, and that does help us," he said.
The disc-shaped reentry capsule, about 5 feet wide and weighing about 450 pounds, will enter the atmosphere at a speed of 24,600 miles per hour.
But once its parachute is deployed, the pod will slow to just over 20 mph, dropping at 14 feet per second, by the time it reaches its "intercept point" about 4,000 feet over the desert floor, NASA said.
The two retrieval copters, each carrying a three-person crew and hovering several miles away from the target area, will swoop in once they spot the parachute, which also will be tracked by radar. The object is for Fleming to snag the chute with a special 20-foot-long hook.
If he misses, he and Rudert will have time to make about 10 passes before the capsule drops to 500 feet, too low for a safe mid-air grab. But Haggard said the pilots successfully hooked the capsule in all 60 of their practice runs.
Once the pod is snagged, it will be flown to a temporary landing spot, where it will be lowered onto a pad, disconnected from its parachute and flown to a nearby Army air field to be lowered gently into a special cradle and then moved into an isolation chamber, NASA said.
08/19/04 18:28 ET
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040819183109990003
