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| Science & Technology |
| Unmanned high altitude airship to undergo maiden flight over Ohio |
| 2011-07-26 |
| Lockheed Martin’s prototype High Altitude Airship may make its maiden voyage from the Akron Airdock soon. The solar-powered blimp – technically called the High Altitude Long Endurance Demonstrator or HALE-D – has been delayed for years because of federal funding problems. At 240 feet long and 70 feet in diameter, this prototype airship is bigger than the 192-foot long, 55-foot diameter Spirit of Goodyear blimp. The test flight is intended to take the untethered airship as high as 60,000 feet over central Ohio until its tests are completed. No limit was given on how long the tests may take. The blimp will be floating above the jet stream in the stratosphere, higher than where commercial jets fly, Lockheed Martin said. It’s possible — but unlikely — that people will be able to see the blimp overhead on a clear day, Lockheed Martin said. |
| Posted by:Anguper Hupomosing9418 |
| #7 There has been some very good systems. RAID was one that deployed balloons on a cable high above Baghdad and gave great intel on the plantings of IED's. The future is remote control and it's very Orwellian. |
| Posted by: newc 2011-07-26 22:53 |
| #6 US-WORLD NAVAL AIRCRAFT CARRIERS = GREAT OR MASSIVE "OFFENSIVE" POWER BUT ALSO GREAT VULNERABILITY. Ditto HT AIRSHIPS as per GREAT OR MASSIVE "DEFENSIVE" POWER MIXED WID GREAT VULNERABILITY. Think integrated "a fully-armed B52 BUFF, Recce-SPAWAR, AC130 SPECTRE, andor BMD Sys that hardly or never leaves a combat area or strategic zone". AFAIK the US Army + USDOD-DARPA are dev WIP designs for utility as an AIRBORNE RR = ORBITAL TROOPS, CARGO LARGE-UNIT/QUANTITY MIL TRANSPORT. The Cold War Soviets recognized the above potential of Airships + deemed it as inherently "destabilizing", demanding that neither US-NATO nor their own WARSAW PACT ever develop + deploy same for military purposes. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2011-07-26 19:21 |
| #5 Mariah is hating on airships always. |
| Posted by: S 2011-07-26 18:30 |
#4 Airships seem to have a perpetual, general purpose curse on them. This one, for example, is in Akron. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2011-07-26 18:20 |
| #3 It is a cover story for the invasion of the evil hobbits from planet Obama. |
| Posted by: Black Bart Elmonter8235 2011-07-26 13:14 |
| #2 Airships seem to have a perpetual, general purpose curse on them. About the only long term success story with them are the Goodyear blimps. And yet, there is a huge military need for such airships, as they can perform detailed surveillance over a vast area; act as a very high bandwidth communications relay; as a much more powerful AWACS controlling the airspace of an entire region; and even working as part of an anti-ballistic missile system. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2011-07-26 10:44 |
| #1 no balloon-boy? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2011-07-26 10:00 |