August 2012
Your magazine was created in the world of monthly print publications and says August on the cover. Meanwhile, I write over Memorial Day weekend as a tropical storm named Beryl is coming ashore 50 miles or so east of where I sit, as winds of 11 on the Beaufort Wind Scale are recorded along the northern Florida coast.
It is raining harder and blowing more than I have ever seen in almost two years living in the Sunshine State. So it’s fitting that I tell you more about Sir Francis Beaufort of the Admiralty and his system of estimating wind strength—later.
Two events on my mind, for widely different reasons, concern a new airplane design from Synergy Aircraft and the successful voyage of Space Exploration Technology (SpaceX) Corp.’s Dragon to supply the International Space Station (ISS).
Synergy Aircraft of Kalispell, Mont. is working on what could be called a “futuristic” project to build an airplane that uses what has been called “breakthrough” technology. With a 1/4-scale remote-control prototype flying, the company—family owned and run by John McGinnis—works out of a garage in that clichéd American tradition of inventiveness. The project has been getting lots of press (Wired, Gizmag, Designboom and more) outside of aviation. Praised by everyone from the EAA to the CAFE Foundation, there is reason those of us related to aviation might want to take notice.
This all caught my attention, not because it is what looks like a very interesting aircraft possibility, but because it appears to be the first time such a project is actively using social media to tell its story and gain support.
The Synergy project may be the first-ever aviation project to use “crowd-sourcing”—also known as “crowd-funding”—to raise its financing. Using the funding website Kickstarter, the financing has as of this writing surpassed its $65,000 initial goal (with 627 backers who have pledged their own money—full disclosure, I pledged $50) and seems well on its way to raising the funds needed to actually build a full-size flying prototype.
Here’s what a Kickstarter donor said in support of Synergy: “I’m a tech entrepreneur and MIT grad who is an avid pilot and type-rated on single pilot jets. … This project is doing groundbreaking aerodynamic work in a garage. It’s what America is all about. The science is sound and based on… concepts that have been studied at places like NASA but never implemented due to the risk averse, hyper-conservative nature of incremental airframe design and certification barriers to entry inherent to the aviation industry. …”
McGinnis describes his design as a five-place, single-engine experimental aircraft which will be pressurized and is distinguished by its unique “double box” tail configuration and the simultaneous application of advanced drag reduction technologies.
“Synergy’s signature shape creates stability and control through induced drag reduction—the glider-like efficiency of a long wingspan packed into a much stronger, compact package,” Synergy says. “Unlike a box wing design, Synergy’s unique double box tail is stabilizing and creates constructive—rather than destructive—biplane interference. Synergy exploits numerous aerodynamic and structural advantages to deliver a roomy, practical, and safe high performance aircraft.”
McGinnis claims that the plane will be 10 times more fuel efficient than the average small jet and cost 10 times less, saying it is the “largest practical fuel economy breakthrough in history.”
Beyond Synergy’s social media and crowd-funding aspects, the company seems to have also connected with a demographic more youthful than General Aviation usually attracts. That alone is remarkable.
Meanwhile, on May 25, Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) announced that it had made history when its Dragon capsule became the first commercial vehicle ever to deliver cargo to the International Space Station. Before this only four government space programs—from the United States, Russia, Japan and the European Space Agency—had done so. It was flying the mission under a 2006 Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) agreement with NASA to carry cargo to and from ISS.
I was enthralled by this news. In addition to my love of flying and airplanes, I also have unfettered affection for the idea of space travel.
There I was, happy over a private company’s accomplishment, when I ran into a friend of mine who has just earned a PhD in aerospace science. He promptly brought me down to earth.
He pointed out two things:
1. SpaceX, and the other four private companies working on the COTS program, are doing so with government money (taxpayer dollars) so the idea that this is private enterprise and not actually a government program might be suspect. And COTS is only one piece of the government money being channeled into private companies working on space projects.
2. SpaceX should be congratulated, he said, for basically replicating technology that was perfected beginning about 1959. “It’s a rocket and a capsule,” he said. “Doesn’t that sound familiar?”
Researching the funding for all this is daunting, but I was able to find some numbers. NASA has $3.8 billion in cargo contracts with SpaceX and a company called Orbital Sciences Corp. and in seed money given to four other companies to develop technologies to transport crews.
SpaceX’s Dragon docked at the space station three days after blasting off atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla. It successfully returned a week later (packed with 1,367 pounds of cargo, including crew items and completed science experiments. The mission was a trial run for its plan to fly 12 cargo-delivery missions to ISS under its $1.6 billion contract with NASA. The company was founded in 2002 by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, who cofounded PayPal.
Orbital Sciences, founded in 1982, is building something called the Antares rocket to deliver cargo to ISS and perform commercial satellite launches. Using up to three stages, the rocket is designed to carry 6.1 metric tons to low-Earth orbit. It is also building a pressurized craft called Cygnus to ride atop Antares. That is designed to carry up to 2.7 metric tons of cargo.
Unlike SpaceX’s Dragon capsule, which is designed to return cargo to the ground as well as deliver it to the space station, Cygnus is a one-use vehicle, like the unmanned resupply craft all the government agencies use—except for the now-defunct shuttles, which were reuseable.
The other three NASA funded companies in the program are:
1. Boeing. To date NASA has spent $132 million on its effort to design a capsule that could ferry up to seven people to and from the space station or other destinations in low-Earth orbit.
2. Blue Origin, founded by Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, is set to get almost $27 million to develop a fully reusable spacecraft.
3. Sierra Nevada Corp. is working on a design called Dream Chaser, a shuttle-like glider designed for from two to seven astronauts. NASA has provided $100 million in seed money to advance the design.
These NASA partnerships with private companies are working with already proven technologies and are not all that challenging, innovative or creative. And nowhere in my research could I find a reliable comparison of the cost between doing it this “private” way and the previous NASA-run programs. So which is more cost effective is still a question. In addition, SpaceX had the support of NASA’s Mission Control on its launch
and recovery.
Government partnerships such as these remind me of the 19th century projects to build the railroads. But don’t get me wrong: I love and support anything related to space travel, even if its replicates what we seem to have already done back in the heady days of Sputnik, Mercury, and Yuri Gagarin.
I just think I feel more comfortable with the Kickstarter model Synergy Aircraft is using.
At the outset I promised a word about Admiral Beaufort. What I want to do is to recommend a book called “Defining the Wind, The Beaufort Scale, and How a 19th-Century Admiral Turned Science into Poetry,” by Scott Huler.
Huler points out in this brilliant book that like all good writing, Beaufort’s 110-word guide to describing the wind is as useful as it is elegant in its simplicity. The book has held me in thrall for several days as Beryl rained itself out. It is both a history and celebration of the life of Beaufort, an admiralty hydrographer whose job it was to track the information British ships relied upon, and a primer about learning to pay attention … a good lesson for navigators and pilots alike.
David Hipschman is a private pilot and aircraft owner. He writes the Heading Bug column here, edits the National Association of Flight Instructors’ Mentor magazine, and also teaches journalism at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Fla. Send questions or comments to editor@www.piperflyer.com.
