The Aviator

Volume 19, Issue 2, February 2004

President’s Corner

Hello Everyone,
Now, I know what it’s like to be inside a freezer for 30 days. Mother Nature has a good way of letting us know who is still the boss. Because of the ice the night of the February meeting the safest place was being home and we only had a light turn out. Rick Ramsey organized a Cross Wind landings video and discussion. I would like to thank Rick for standing in for me and for lining up a very interesting topic and Jim Ramsey for opening up the Terminal Building for the evening. We plan to repeat this meeting another night when the weather isn't so bad.
We are going to be trying some new ideas for the upcoming meetings including changing the format. From now on we‘ll do away with the business part of the meeting which should make the meetings more enjoyable. A business meeting will be held during the month to conduct Chapter business. Surfing through many of our fellow Chapter web sites, this is what they do and it seems to work great for them.
We’re putting more effort into finding interesting guest speakers for our meetings, with one scheduled for each of the next 3 months. We’re also trying to line up some activities at the airpark involving the airport and us and we’re going to get the new Chapter Hanger/clubhouse back on track. One of our main goals this year will be to get more young people involved in aviation. We have one very interesting project that we hope will work out; it’s to bring another aviation group to the airport. More on that when more details are arranged.
In other words we are hoping to get back to what an EAA Chapter should be all about and what the organization has been doing for 51 years: Fun, educational and the sharing the love of aviation no matter what form it may be. We’re going to try our best to make this an interesting year for this Chapter and our members.

Frank Agosh, the Tower Controller from Ohio County Airport, will be our guest speaker for the March meeting. One I hope everyone will find interesting and useful if you are going to fly into a Controlled Field. Frank, I have been told, is a very entertaining speaker.

Well, that’s all folks. Remember if you know of someone who is interested in Aviation, bring him or her along and introduce them to the World of Aviation. Remember Spring is only 30 days away.

See you at the next meeting

Dave

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Officers

News

The Chuck Yeager model Club {IPMS} Will hold its annual model show and contest April 4th at the R. J. Bush Sports Center in.For info call Dean Haun 748-8099.

Wheeling Airport Cookout, June 29 at 5 pm—Guest speakers include past world aerobatic champions Sean T. Tucker and Mike ?. This is always a spectacular event with great food and a lot of fun. Don’t miss this one - Ed

Cleveland Air show (www.clevelandairshow.com) - Sat. Sept 4th, Please contact Dean Haun (phaun@comcast.net) or tel: 304-748 8099 for reservations. More information will be available shortly.

Our Chapter Business meeting date will be the third Wednesday of each month.
Starting on Apri 21
Time 7:00pm
At the Airport.

If you are interested in aviation and don't receive the Avweb newsletter I highly recommend you take a look at it and subscribe. It is also free. So what is your national EAA organization doing? Please visit their website. If you have any comments or feedback about this newsletter or articles you would like to have included please let me know - Ed

 

So what is NASA up to?

NASA has released a new Strategic Plan outlining a new approach to space exploration using a “building block” strategy to implement a sustained and affordable human and robotic program to explore the solar system. This plan includes developing the innovative technologies, knowledge, and infrastructures both to explore and to support decisions about the destinations for human exploration and promote international and commercial participation in exploration. A brief summary of the roadmap follows;

Return the space shuttle to flight as soon as possible, focusing its use on completing the space station by the end of the decade and then retiring it.

Focus U.S. research and use of the International Space Station on supporting space exploration goals, with emphasis on understanding how the space environment affects astronaut health and capabilities and developing countermeasures. Undertake lunar exploration activities to enable sustained human and robotic exploration of Mars and more distant destinations in the solar system;

• Starting no later than 2008, initiate a series of robotic missions to the Moon to confirm and map lunar resources in detail to prepare for and support future human exploration activities;

• Conduct the first extended human expedition to the lunar surface as early as 2015 and no later than 2020; and

• Use lunar exploration activities to further science, and to develop and test new approaches, technologies, and systems, including use of lunar and other space resources, to support sustained human space exploration to Mars and other destinations.

Mars and Other Destinations

• Aggressively pursue the search for water and life on Mars using robotic explorers. The Spirit and Opportunity rovers that landed on Mars in January 2004 are the latest in a series of research missions planned to explore Mars through 2010. By the end of this decade, three rovers, a Lander, and two orbiters will have visited the planet.

• Conduct robotic exploration of Mars to search for evidence of life, to understand the history of the solar system, and to prepare for future human exploration;

• Conduct robotic exploration across the solar system for scientific purposes and to support human exploration. In particular, explore Jupiter’s moons, asteroids and other bodies to search for evidence of life, to understand the history of the solar system, and to search for resources;

• Conduct advanced telescope searches for Earth-like planets and habitable environments around other stars;

• Develop and demonstrate power generation, propulsion, life support, and other key capabilities required to support more distant, more capable, and/or longer duration human and robotic exploration of Mars and other destinations; and

• Conduct human expeditions to Mars after acquiring adequate knowledge about the planet using robotic missions and after successfully demonstrating sustained human exploration missions to the Moon.

In the 1970s, NASA’s twin Voyager missions flew by Jupiter and confirmed that three of its’ moons—Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede are covered in water ice. Now in the early stages of planning the Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter is planned to return this decade for lengthy and detailed investigations necessary to confirm and map the underground oceans of these worlds in detail.

NASA’s Cassini mission, currently on its way to Saturn, will encounter Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, next January. Titan is icy like Jupiter’s moons, but unlike Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede, Titan has an atmosphere that is about as dense as Earth’s, is composed of many of the same chemicals as Earth’s early atmosphere, and is believed to contain complex, pre-biotic chemistry. Titan may turn out to be a key laboratory for understanding how biology arises from chemistry.

In 1995, astronomers discovered the first solar system besides our own. Since then, astronomers have found over 100 planets orbiting other stars—and the number continues to climb with new discoveries. Because of the obscuring effects of the Earth’s atmosphere, the detection and characterization of small planets with normal orbits like Earth is extremely challenging using ground-based telescopes. NASA’s Astronomical Search for Origins program will use a variety of techniques this decade to greatly expand the number and variety of known extrasolar planets. New space telescopes like the Spitzer and James Webb Space Telescopes, the Kepler mission, and the Space Interferometry mission, will search newly formed planets circling young stars, take planetary surveys of thousands of faraway stars, and detect planets only a few times larger than Earth around very nearby stars. The results from these telescopes will be used in the design of an advanced space telescope, the Terrestrial Planet Finder, to be launched during the next decade. The Terrestrial Planet Finder will be capable of finding Earth-like planets and detecting the chemicals in their atmospheres.

Space Transportation Capabilities Supporting Exploration

• Develop a new crew exploration vehicle (Project Constellation) to provide crew transportation for missions beyond low Earth orbit;

« Conduct the initial test flight before the end of this decade in order to provide an operational capability to support human exploration missions no later than 2014;

• Separate to the maximum practical extent crew from cargo transportation to the International Space Station and for launching exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit;

« Acquire cargo transportation as soon as practical and affordable to support missions to and from the International Space Station; and

« Acquire crew transportation to and from the International Space Station, as required, after the Space Shuttle is retired from service.

Exploration and discovery are key agents of growth in society—technologically, economically, socially, internationally, and intellectually. This plan sets in motion activities that will contribute to change and growth in the U.S. and the world over the next century.

Mars Trivia

1/ On August 27, 2003, Mars was closer to earth than it had been in…

A) 60 years

B) 60,000 years

C) 6 million years

2/ What is the average distance between Mars and Earth?

3/ What is the average temperature on Mars?

4/ Name one of the two Mars rovers that landed in January?

Answers: 1/ B 2/ About 50 million miles 3/ -81 F 4/ Spirit and Opportunity

Information derived from the NASA website, see www.nasa.gov.

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Membership renewal:

Well folks, it’s that time again for chapter dues. Please renew now and if you have any changes in your contact details, please let Dave Tulenko or Don Green know. Plus we need your National EAA Number and it’s expiration date. You must be a national member in order to be a member of the Chapter. We never really pushed this in the past but unfortunately it is now necessary. So try to get your completed membership forms sent in before February 29 or you will no longer receive the newsletter. Don’t miss out on the fun, we have an interesting year lined up.

Recycling:

Please bring all your old newspapers, magazines and recyclables to the chapter meeting on Tuesday the 2nd of March.

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Dates to remember:

"Wings" Safety Seminar, Wheeling Airport, June 29, 5 pm

Sun ‘n Fun, Lakeland FL, April 13 to 19

Wheeling Airport Cookout, June 29 at 5 pm

EAA AirVenture, Oshkosh, July 27 to August 2

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The Prop Busters have three openings in their Flying Club…

If you are interest in some real affordable flying, contact Dick Hawkins (Prop Buster President) or Tom Cucarese (Treasurer ) 740 266-9305 for more details on becoming a Flying Club Member.

Their airplane is a Cessna 150 and is based at the airpark.

What does it cost to belong:     Initiation  Fee      $250.00

                                                    Dues:                   $200.00 a year

Aircraft Flying Rate:                Per Hour               $35.00 wet.

Your Flying Insurance is included in with your membership to the Flying Club. 

There is also a web page flying calendar, so flying times can be seen by the club members.

Aircraft is based at its Jefferson County Airpark hanger.

So if your looking for very affordable flying, this is the place for you.