Sunjammer, World's Largest Solar Sail, Passes Key Test for 2015 Launch
http://www.space.com/23162-nasa-sunjamm ... plete.html
There is a video and I'll talk about that later but for now, the 'facts:'
From the article, (me in bold):
Here is an image of the open sail:When Sunjammer launches in 2015, it will be the largest solar sail ever flown. Covering an area of almost 13,000 square feet (1,200 square meters), the full sail will span approximately a third the length of a football field. Despite its size, the enormous sail will be only about five millionths of a meter thick, keeping its weight down to 70 pounds (31 kilograms).
Sunjammer will monitor solar activity as it demonstrates the validity of relying solely on low-cost, propellantless solar winds for spacecraft navigation.
In one general direction only, and away from what it is observing.
Ultimately, Sunjammer could form a part of a fleet of solar sail crafts providing an early warning system for space weather.
Hey yeah, when they dissapear from NASA's monitors because their electronics have been fried by a solar storm, we will know in advance that we are screwed.
Check out the black pole on the right of the chamber; the blue light from beneath the sail, that illuminates the rest of the area, does not illuminate the pole, but for some reason they have still taken it's presence into account by creating a kind of 'shadow' for it on the wall.
The lighting of this 'photograph' is some of the strangest I have ever seen, even by NASA standards.
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In the video, Charles Chafer, CEO of L'Garde's space services, talks a lot about involving people in the mission, moving from old polluting rockets to this 'propellantless' tech (still, it's going to take a rocket to get it into space right?) and how they will have most of the world watching as this craft deploys. Public involvement amounts to a 'very high tech camera out there' so people can go to L'Garde's website and watch the sail unfold in real time. I assume this event will also be televised.
It's only when we hear from Stephen Eisele, VP of marketing, Space Services INC. that we find out the real purpose of the Sunjammer mission, and why all those millions of people watching will feel 'intrinsically involved' and 'allow them to feel part of the mission.'
It turns out that the Sunjammer is essentially a giant space billboard.
Stephen Eisele:
'For the first time, a company will be able to take their brand and showcase it to the world using the medium of space as a unique platform, to advertise, to market and to reach out through multiple public participation missions.'
Participation here seems to come down to looking at a fake spacecraft on a website and identifying with a brand, as opposed to the old way - looking at a fake spacecraft on a television and identifying with a brand in the commercial break. The revolutionary difference? Now you do both these things AT THE SAME TIME.Charles Chafer, CEO, elaborates (or should I say, bullshits) further:
'For a private company to be involved, it's an enormous opportunity for visibility. Every NASA mission attracts hundreds of millions of people to the website, every private mission that we've done has reached a billion media impressions. And so there's no better way for a company that's looking to get there name out than to be associated with this really cool space mission that we know is happening, and that is interesting to people, fundamentally interesting to people because both of what the technology is and what the technology is being used for. I can't think of a better way to engage people all over the planet than to move them from the passive observing of something going on to the active participation of being involved in that mission.'
I don't know what to say. This has to be one of the saddest and most cynical fake space mission of all time. Faking space craft to captures peoples attention in the form of 'media impressions.'
The Sunjammer project's slogan? 'A mission of purpose'
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Lastly, I wanted to share this comment someone made on Jon Rappaport's blog yesterday:
A horrific vision, but seems to be what is actually happening. It’s like a Philip K. Dick dystopia, but just like in those books, the protagonists are people just like ourselves; imperfect and disempowered but moral and determined.