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US Army wants helicopters to refuel at robotic pumps
Militaries regularly set up fueling stations at forward bases so that helicopters can get back to the fight as quickly as possible. However, requiring fuel crews creates huge risks and logistical headaches: you're sending people to a dangerous, isolated section of the battlefield for a fairly mundane role. Thankfully, the US Army might not need to take that risk for much longer. It's testing an unmanned station, the Autonomous & Robotic Remote Refueling Point (AR3P for short), that can top up a helicopter with no human involvement. Much like Tesla's robotic charger, it would use self-aligning, articulated arms to hook a fuel line to a helicopter all by itself. That, in turn, would let helicopters fly at all hours without putting footsoldiers in harm's way, and would likely refuel them faster.
NASA is concerned about SpaceX's rocket fueling practices
NASA is a little nervous about SpaceX's future crewed flights. The Wall Street Journal has obtained a letter from December 2015 showing that an agency International Space Station committee has been worried about the safety of SpaceX's planned fueling strategy. While the nature of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets will require that it fill up while the crew is aboard (it has to supply the supercooled fuel 30 minutes before launch), that goes against "50 years" of booster safety practices around the world, according to the letter. The committee raised the issue again with NASA officials days before SpaceX's launchpad explosion, but hadn't heard anything for weeks afterward.
Canada's Dextre robot refuels faux satellite from the ISS in first-of-a-kind test
Move over, Canadarm. You may have helped the space shuttle fleet repair the Hubble Telescope and build the International Space Station, but there's another robotic tool that's the apple of the Great White North's eye. Dextre, the Canadian Space Agency's dual-armed mechanical "handyman," has successfully refueled a faux satellite from the ISS as part of NASA's and the CSA's joint Robotic Refueling Mission. Not only did the exercise demonstrate how satellites could be juiced up in space and have their lives extended, but the CSA says it's a first for the history books, to boot. Since 2011, Dextre completed a trio of tests to show how it could service satellites that weren't built for being pried opened in space. Late this week, NASA and CSA robotics controllers removed two safety caps from a washing machine-sized mock satellite, snipped two sets of retaining wires and pumped in a bit of ethanol. Sure, you could take a Frankenstein-like approach and cobble together new satellites from old ones, but Dextre's trials indicate there's promise for a proactive tactic that would keep existing hardware humming.
Shell opens America's first pipelined hydrogen-fueling station in Southern California
Residents of SoCal's Torrance should consider themselves lucky, as they're now living in America's first-ever city to have a pipelined hydrogen-fueling station. You can thank Shell and Toyota for picking up this government-funded green project. Sure, while the few other hydrogen stations still rely on delivery by supply truck (presumably running on diesel, ironically), this nevertheless marks a new milestone for our squeaky clean fuel, and it's only a matter of time before more stations get piped up to Air Products' hydrogen plants. If there's any indication of a time frame, Wired reminds us that 2015 should see the arrival of many new mass-market hydrogen cars from Toyota, Honda, and Mercedes-Benz. Not long to go now, fellow tree huggers.
NASA collects proposals for space fueling stations
Sometimes rocket science is actually, you know, rocket science. Getting to the moon was tough enough, but deep space exploration poses all manner of additional concerns -- like getting back home alive, for one thing. And then there's the issue of fuel, something long distance trips require a lot of -- but stocking up on here on Earth means potential weight problems at launch. One proposal offered up in the past is space-based fueling stations conveniently located in key spots on the way to a distant destinations like the Moon, Mars, and asteroids. NASA is collecting proposals that can demonstrate the validity of such a plan, including the ability to store liquid oxygen and hydrogen, transfer it, and have a ship approach for fueling. If you think you've got your bases covered -- and can keep it under $200 million -- you've got until May 31st at 11:59 PM EST to hand over a proposal.
