Lunar Lander Challenge Round One - The X PRIZE Cup

Well it is already October 20 passed and I missed the X-Prize Cup today.
One more day, tomorrow, October 21, 2006.
Did you go?
- LRK -

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http://www.xprizecup.com/event.php?sub=event_schedule
The X PRIZE Cup takes place on Friday and Saturday, October 20 and 21, from 7am to 4pm. Rocket launches begin early in the morning to take advantage of optimal weather conditions. A brief overview:

Friday, October 20: 7am - 4pm, Gates Open at 6am

Lunar Lander Challenge Round One Competitions Vertical Rocket Challenge Round One Competitions Student Field Trip Student Rocket Fly-Off Jet Pack Flight
T-38 Fly-Overs
Rocket Bike
Rocket Truck
Sounding Rockets
Elevator Games

Saturday, October 21: 7am - 4pm, Gates Open at 6am

Lunar Lander Challenge Round Two Competitions Vertical Rocket Challenge Round Two Competitions
T-38 Fly-Overs
Rocket Bike
Rocket Truck
Sounding Rockets
Elevator Games
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http://www.spacefellowship.com/News/?cat=33
The Wirefly X Prize Cup, 2006!
October 19th, 2006
[offer]

It is now only a few hours before the beginning of the Wirefly X Prize Cup, 2006! In this news post I’ll share first some basic info and then some links to live blogs at the event, webcast and the latest developments.

Note; Ticket holders, please arrive early, gates open at 6AM. Launches begin at 7AM.
If you can’t visit the event, you can visit the X PRIZE Cup website, the provide a live webcast!
http://www.xprizecup.com/live.php?sub=live_overview
http://www.space.com/xprizecup/video/

This year’s Cup features three spectacular competitions with over $2.5 million in prize purses, multiple high-powered sounding rocket launches, the unveiling of the Rocket Racing League’s development X-Racer, multiple static engine test firings live on the field, fly-overs by the T-38 astronaut trainer, and a variety of other rocket surprises in the air and on the ground.

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Thanks for looking up with me.

Larry Kellogg

Web Site: http://lkellogg.vttoth.com/LarryRussellKellogg/
BlogSpot: http://kelloggserialreports.blogspot.com/
RSS link: http://kelloggserialreports.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Newsltr.: https://news.altair.com/mailman/listinfo/lunar-update
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http://www.space.com/news/051009_xprize_challenge.html
Centennial Challenges To Spur Suborbital Rocketry By Leonard David Senior Space Writer
posted: 09 October 2005
02:33 pm ET

LAS CRUCES, New Mexico – NASA unveiled today two new Centennial Challenges–-both geared to stimulating new reusable suborbital rocketry, as well as help hone technology for exploration of the Moon.

The prizes represent collaboration between NASA and the X Prize Foundation, announced here during Countdown to the X Prize festivities.

NASA’s Centennial Challenges were established to conduct prize competitions in support of the Vision for Space Exploration and ongoing NASA programs. The idea is to crate novel and lower-cost solutions to engineering obstacles in civil space and aeronautics from new sources of innovation in industry, academia, and the public.

Signing ceremony

"Today we are signing a letter formalizing the intent of NASA Centennial Challenges and the X Prize Foundation to work towards a future agreement for two X Prize Competitions," said NASA’s Brant Sponberg, Program Manager of Centennial Challenges at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

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http://www.space.com/adastra/adastra_lunarchallenge_060505.html
NASA, X Prize Foundation Shoot For the Moon By Leonard David

National Space Society
posted: 05 May 2006
02:00 pm ET

UPDATE: Story first posted 12:37 p.m. EDT

LOS ANGELES, California -- A Lunar Lander Analog Challenge is being spearheaded by NASA and the X Prize Foundation—a $2.5 million dollar NASA Centennial Challenge dedicated to enhancing the space agency’s return to the Moon effort.

Details of the challenge were outlined here today by NASA’s Deputy Administrator Shana Dale at the International Space Development Conference. X Prize Chairman, Peter Diamandis presented the rules and officially opened the competition for team registration.

“NASA’s contribution to the Lunar Lander analog challenge is $2 million. This is the most significant investment yet, in terms of prizes that we’re doing under the Centennial Challenges,” Dale told SPACE.com.

Dale said that NASA is looking at ways the space agency can tap into innovation in the private sector. That means working with traditional aerospace, entrepreneurial companies involved in aerospace, as well as high-tech firms that have no business at all with NASA, she added.

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http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2006/may/HQ_06211_lunar_competition_prt.htm

Michael Braukus/ Dolores Beasley
Headquarters, Washington
(202) 358-1979/1753

Ian Murphy
X PRIZE Foundation, Santa Monica, Calif.
(310) 689-6397


May 5, 2006
RELEASE: 06-211

NASA Announces Lunar Lander Analog Competition Agreement

NASA's Deputy Administrator Shana Dale announced Friday the agency's Centennial Challenges program has signed an agreement with the X PRIZE Foundation to conduct the $2 million Lunar Lander Analog Challenge.

"NASA's Centennial Challenge program is using the tool of prize competitions, so successfully demonstrated by the X-PRIZE, to plant the seeds for future space commercial activities," Dale said. "We're confident the Lunar Lander Analog Competition will stimulate the development of the kinds of rockets and landing systems that NASA needs to return to the moon, while also accelerating the development of the private sub-orbital space flight industry."

Dale made the announcement at the International Space Development conference in Los Angeles. The challenge will take place at the X PRIZE Cup Expo in Las Cruces, N. M., Oct. 20-22.

NASA is sponsoring the challenge, offering the competition's largest cash prize yet for developing a versatile space vehicle that one day may support exploration of the moon. The X PRIZE Foundation is administering and executing the competitions at no cost to NASA, providing the venue for the competition and encouraging involvement by a diverse field of competitors.

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http://www.xprizecup.com/
Welcome to the
Wirefly X PRIZE Cup 2006

Welcome to the official website for the Wirefly X PRIZE Cup, Earth's great space exposition. This year's Cup features three spectacular competitions with over $2.5 million in prize purses, multiple high-powered sounding rocket launches, the unveiling of the Rocket Racing League's development X-Racer, multiple static engine test firings live on the field, fly-overs by the T-38 astronaut trainer, and a variety of other rocket surprises in the air and on the ground.
http://www.xprizecup.com/story.php?page_id=71

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$2.5 Million in Prize Competitions

Building on the legendary prize methodology that the Ansari X PRIZE used to catalyze SpaceShipOne into history, this year's Cup see's the launch of three important competitions. The Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge (a NASA-supported prize effort to demonstrate the ability of private companies to develop next-generation lunar landers), the Vertical Rocket Challenge (another lunar-landing-technology-focused competition), and the The Spaceward Foundation's Space Elevator Games (a test of over 20 teams to use light to power a vehicle along a tether, this year up about 50 meters, but eventually hundreds and thousands of miles). Imagine pressing an elevator button that says, "Moon!"
http://www.xprizecup.com/story.php?page_id=74


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NMSU students assist in launch pad design.

Students from New Mexico State University are recreating the surface of the Moon as part of the X Prize Cup's Lunar Lander Challenge.

In the Lunar Lander Challenge, Vertical rockets will take off and land on special landing pads designed to look just like the craggy surface of the Moon. Those landing pads are being made from concrete formulated by Surveying/Civil Engineering Technology majors at NMSU.
http://www.xprizecup.com/story.php?page_id=93

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http://www.hobbyspace.com/nucleus/index.php?catid=25&blogid=1
http://www.hobbyspace.com/nucleus/index.php?itemid=2610

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My snips, go read the whole talk. Lots of food for thought. - LRK -
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http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=22396
X Prize Comments by Mike Griffin
STATUS REPORT
Date Released: Friday, October 20, 2006
Source: NASA HQ

image

Thank you for inviting me to speak to you at this X-Prize Cup Summit. I want to congratulate Peter Diamandis and the other organizers of this event for bringing together this eclectic group. An insightful, and often all too apt, observation goes: "There are three types of people in the world. People who make things happen, people who watch things happen, and people who wonder what happened." The group assembled here clearly fits into the first category, and so for my part, I'd like to spend some time with you this morning wondering what happened More seriously, I believe this observation needs a fourth category, ahead of the three given above; first there must be the people who think about what ought to happen. These are the visionaries, and none of us would be here at this event today without them. So, I want to spend some time with you thinking about what needs to happen next.

All of you here will be familiar with our new Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) demonstrations, being conducted under the framework of NASA Space Act Agreements. These landmark agreements are, truly, NASA's most significant investment to date in attempting to spur the development of the commercial space industry. But let me say this at the outset: NASA can do even better in partnering with the commercial and entrepreneurial space sector in carrying out our nation's Vision for Space Exploration. However, let me be equally blunt about the other side of the coin: "partnership" with NASA is not a synonym for "helping NASA spend its money". Just as with our international partnerships, I expect commercial and venture capital partners to have "skin in the game", contributing resources toward a common goal that is greater than that which could be easily afforded by NASA alone, while figuring out how to make a profit from it!

Thus, it is important for the future that NASA's investments productively leverage the engine of the American economy, a GDP valued at over $13 trillion per year, to help us carry out our mission of space exploration. As the President's Science Advisor Jack Marburger stated earlier this year, "questions about the Vision boil down to whether we want to incorporate the Solar System in our economic sphere, or not." I think that I can guess how most of you who are here today would answer that question. And, indeed, I have said in other venues that for me also, this is one of the core principles justifying human exploration and expansion into space.

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So, what about space? We now have more than 50 years of investment, through both NASA and the DoD, in space technology and systems development. But what we have not had is a stable, predictable government market for space services sufficient to stimulate the development of a commercial space industry analogous to that which was seen in the growth of aviation. My hope is that with the seed money we are putting into the COTS program, we can demonstrate the possibility of commercial cargo and crew transportation to the International Space Station, and that subsequently NASA will be able to meet its ISS logistics needs by purchasing these demonstrated services. If we can do this, we will be able to change the paradigm for transportation services to be more in line with the air mail service of the 1920s, meeting the logistics needs of the ISS, some 7,000 to 10,000 kilograms per year, after the Space Shuttle is retired in 2010. In the process, we may be able to spur innovation for low-cost access to space. This is a carefully- considered investment with known risks that we can all see and appreciate, but with a potentially huge upside that makes it well worth the risks.

I'll risk repeating myself to ensure that everyone fully understands how serious NASA takes the COTS demonstrations: if these commercial service capabilities are successfully demonstrated and cost-effective, NASA will welcome and use them. That is our default strategy for ISS re-supply. Most of you will probably agree that meeting or beating the government's cost to provide space transportation services shouldn't be too difficult for private industry to do. I hope you are right. I want these demonstrations to succeed; however, my wanting it won't make it so. If these capabilities are not successfully demonstrated, then NASA's fall-back position is to rely on the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle or international partner cargo and crew service capabilities for ISS logistics support.

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Now, I must be clear that the development of space tourism is not a part of NASA's charter. NASA was founded during the Cold War, soon after the launch of Sputnik, when the United States was in a race with the Soviets. NASA and the early civil space program were instruments of American preeminence in the world, at a time when an important component of such was seen to be preeminence in space. NASA achieved the goals that were set for it by the nation's policymakers in that era, and did so with remarkable brilliance, so much so that even today we remain in awe of what the Apollo generation did. Now, some have since posited that NASA somehow failed the American public by not opening up the experience of space travel to the broader population. This is patent nonsense; the agency could not fail at something it was never asked to do. Such a mandate was simply never in NASA's charter; if it were, I would question the wisdom of such a role for a government entity. However, as we go forward with the Vision for Space Exploration, it emphatically is our duty to encourage and leverage nascent commercial space capabilities. Not only is it the right thing to do in a country whose economic system is rooted in free market concepts, but it will also be a necessity if we are to achieve the goals set out for the U.S. civil space program.

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In another vein, the NASA Authorization Act of 2005 also designates the U.S. segment of the International Space Station a national laboratory. NASA is actively seeking commercial partners who would like to use the ISS for their own experiments. After the loss of Space Shuttle Columbia, NASA was forced to curtail a great deal of ISS research, and with our focus on the use of the Space Shuttle system for ISS assembly over the next few years, I believe that commercial cargo and crew services will prove invaluable for increasing access to space and to the ISS for these commercial experiments.

Also in connection with the ISS, we need to be open to novel concepts which can enhance the utility of this multi-billion dollar facility. As one example, former astronaut and present-day entrepreneur Franklin Chang-Diaz, creator and proponent of the Vasimir electric propulsion concept, has opened discussions with NASA in connection with the possible use of the Vasimir engine for ISS orbit maintenance. We don't know, yet, whether this particular approach makes sense or not, but if it does, there might be a classic "win-win" strategy here; we gain experience with a potentially useful space propulsion concept, and we reduce the amount of propellant delivery needed for ISS reboost, leaving room in the logistics manifest for more productive cargo. This is the kind of private-public synergy that can serve us well.

While we are on the theme of innovative approaches to commercial space endeavors, I want to congratulate Pete Worden and his team at Ames for working with Bigelow Aerospace to secure a piggyback ride for their Genebox experiment on Bigelow's Genesis inflatable space habitat demonstration. I believe that this is one of many innovative, short turnaround ideas that we'll be seeing from Pete over the next several years. He is turning Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley into a "Mecca" for space entrepreneurs, where among other things we are hosting the Red Planet venture capital fund, similar in some ways to the CIA's In-Q-Tel operation, to leverage innovators and investors who have not typically done business with NASA.

It should be no surprise to anyone here that in my first few weeks as NASA Administrator, I met with Burt Rutan, Elon Musk, Bob Bigelow, and other space entrepreneurs to hear their ideas, or that I want a healthy, pragmatic dialogue between NASA and the commercial and entrepreneurial space community. Several people on my senior management team, including Shana Dale, Rex Geveden, Scott Pace, Pete Worden, Bill Claybaugh, Chris Shank, and numerous others are intimately familiar with the concerns of the commercial space community, and we are also realists. We are mindful of the pitfalls (and frankly, pratfalls) of all too many endeavors between space companies and NASA.

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http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/calendar/#0610

Oct 20 - Asteroid 2006 TL Near-Earth Flyby (0.048 AU) http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db_shm?des=2006+TL
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemerides/Unusual/K06T00L.html

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WHAT THE MIND CAN CONCEIVE, AND BELIEVE, IT WILL ACHIEVE - LRK

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