Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide
Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide
The Forde Files No. 208
Engineer Claudia Herrera holds a model in front of the work-in-progress prototype X-57 battery-powered electric aircraft, propelled by 12 small and two large engines.
Life Support Technician Phillip Weller instructs media volunteer David DeCristofaro of Bakersfield during DeCristofaro's virtual ejection from an aircraft.
The 30-by 15-foot X-57 flight simulator.
32-year NASA engineer Allen Parker explains how a 180-micron-diameter fiberoptic strand (the size of a human hair) can measure vehicle structural stress.
Weller with "Bob," the ER-2 pressure suit, which keeps a pilot from getting the bends and protects him or her during the force of ejection.
Research Pilot Jim Less, who said that life support research is catching up on the understanding of masks, oxygen and g-forces as they affect pilots. "It is a lot more complicated than anybody realized," he said.
Aerospace Technician Walt Kondracki in front of the oldest F-15 in the world, still contributing as a research vehicle.
The challenge of conquering space makes for a motivated workforce at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
"NASA was named the best place in to work in the federal government for the eighth year in a row," NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said by video feed at a social (internet-based) media event Feb. 10 at Armstrong Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base. "We are leading the world into a new and dynamic era of space flight."
Bridenstine set the day's tone in the feed from Stennis Space Center in Miss. as he announced a robust federal budget aimed at returning humans to the moon by 2024 and establishing the moon as a base to launch explorations on Mars (the "Moon to Mars" mission).
"NASA will launch American astronauts on American rockets for the first time in nearly a decade," said Bridenstine, 44, whose enthusiasm creates an irresistible gravitational pull.
Participants at the Armstrong event spoke with the engineers and pilots – many of whom live in Tehachapi -- who support space flight programs and develop technological advances for military and commercial aircraft. Their research evolves in small instrument-packed rooms and in hangars that house experimental "X" aircraft as well as older workhorses whose innards and bodies are constantly being altered in the quest for data.
