HeatShield
Latest
SpaceX tests heat shields that will stop its Starship from burning up
After successfully getting its Crew Dragon capsule to the International Space Station (ISS) and back, SpaceX has shifted focus to another huge project: the interplanetary Starship. In a tweet, Elon Musk showed off tests on the Starship's heat shield, the part that will keep it from burning up when it returns to Earth. The blow-torch like devices brought the temperatures up to 1,650 degrees Kelvin (2,500 degrees F) at the most extreme, white-hot regions -- enough to stand the heat of orbital re-entry, Musk said.
Mars 2020 lander's heat shield cracks in testing
One of Mars 2020's heat shields cracked after a week-long series of tests, and NASA has no choice but to ask Lockheed Martin to build a replacement. The heat shield's purpose is to envelope and protect the Mars 2020 rover and landing system so they don't burn up when they enter the Martian atmosphere. Since the system will have to endure temperatures up to 3,800 degrees Fahrenheit, NASA and Lockheed Martin (its contractor for the mission) subjected the shield to forces up to 20 percent greater than what it'll encounter during entry.
NASA's heat shield tech could save firefighters' lives
NASA has teamed up with the Department of Agriculture's Forest Service to see if the agency's heat shield technology could be adapted to protect people during forest fires. Currently, firefighters carry a 4.3-pound "personal fire shelter" -- a large tinfoil snuggie that's designed to keep them safe from extreme heat. NASA, however, thinks that the technology it developed to prevent spacecraft from burning up in the atmosphere could do a vastly superior job.
Video: NASA rockets inflatable heat shield 124 miles up, deploys it successfully
Space is mighty cool and the Earth's atmosphere isn't particularly hot either (most of it, anyway), but when you transition from one to the other a lot of friction can be generated. NASA typically uses gas-generating ablative shields for smaller orbiters and of course everyone is familiar with the silica tiles on the bottom of the space shuttle, but now it's tested a rather more lightweight and compact option: an inflatable shield. It's comprised of layers of silicon-coated kevlar fabric that, at least for this initial test, inflates in 90 seconds and forms a sort of saucer shape that's just perfect for keeping MUFON's phone lines busy. There's a dizzying video of it being blasted out of the atmosphere just after the break, and we think you'll be seeing plenty more of this tech deployed on future martian landers and the like.[Via Gizmodo]
