At exactly 3,000 miles into Road Trip 2009, CNET News reporter Daniel Terdiman and the Audi Q7 TDI clean diesel SUV he's road-testing were on the road alongside Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)CRATERS OF THE MOON, Idaho--It's hard for me to believe, because I still feel like I just started Road Trip 2009, but I've already driven enough miles to have crossed the entire United States.
Already it's been 18 days, and on Wednesday, I hit exactly 3,000 miles since I started this project. And it was in one of the most foreign and awe-inspiring places I've ever seen: alongside the road adjacent to Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve.
I'll post a story and photo gallery on this huge and incredible place tomorrow, so I won't get into details on it now. But suffice it to say that if you spend any time here, you know a little bit about what it must be like to walk on surfaces that aren't here on Earth.
The odometer may read 1,000 miles, but Road Trip 2009 has actually been on the highways of Colorado, Utah and Idaho--with brief crossings into Arizona and Nevada--for 3,000 miles already. How many more miles will there be?
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Now, I've moved on, have visited Craters of the Moon, and have urged my readers to help me figure out what to do in Boise, Idaho. I've also picked your brains about the best apps for the new iPhone 3GS.
Each year, Road Trip challenges me with an incredible roster of destinations and a non-stop pace. But it's always worth it. And whether I'm driving enough miles to cross the country, or adding enough miles to return again, I'm going to keep on sharing my experiences with you. I hope you enjoy them.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
This military equipment is based in Utah. The first person to tell me what and where it is wins a prize.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Update (9:22 a.m.): We have a winner. It's a BOMARC B--Boeing/Marc CIM-10B surface-to-air missile housed at the Hill Air Force Museum, near Ogden, Utah.
BOISE, Idaho--Out here on the highways of Colorado, Utah, and Idaho, I've seen a lot. I'm on Road Trip 2009 and making daily stops at military installations, national parks, small towns, big cities, energy research institutions, and more.
That means I take a lot of pictures, and every day from here until the end of Road Trip 2009, I'll be presenting you with one picture--and a challenge.
On Wednesday, I challenged you to identify the large yellow sphere, in the picture below, that's located in Arco, Idaho. In part it was because I wanted to know what my readers would think it was and, I'll be honest, it was also because I didn't know myself, and I wanted to. I got lots of responses. But, my dear readers, none of them seemed like the correct answer. So the prize for being the first to send me the right answer is still available.
What is this yellow sphere in Arco, Idaho? Tell me and you could win a prize.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Now, however, I'm offering up a picture that I do know the truth about. So in this case, I want to hear from you about what it is and where.
I'll give you a hint: it's a Cold War-era relic, clearly military, and currently located in Utah.
If you're the first person to send me the right answer, Thursday's prize is yours.
Please send your thoughts to daniel--dot--terdiman--at--cnet--dot--com, and include "Pic of the day" in the subject line. If you're the one, I'll get back to you.
Good luck.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
In 1955, the tiny town of Arco, Idaho, became the first community in the 'free world' to be powered by nuclear-based electricity. With the power coming from the nearby Experimental Breeder Reactor I, operated by the Nuclear Reactor Testing Station. Over time, the idea of using nuclear power for municipal electricity fell out of favor. But today, at the Idaho National Lab, the leading U.S. Department of Energy nuclear energy research institution, the idea is very much at the forefront, as scientists and policymakers alike search for ways to provide more power while creating less of a carbon footprint.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)ARCO, Idaho--On July 17, 1955, this tiny town, which might otherwise have forever escaped notoriety of any kind, was put on the map for a very historic reason: It became the first place in the "free world" to be powered by "electrical energy developed from the atom."
The power was generated by the Experimental Breeder Reactor run by the nearby Nuclear Reactor Testing Station, and the flipping of the switch seemed to usher in a new era for the United States and the world: the nuclear era.
Over time, the U.S. and other countries grew more and more attracted to the idea of nuclear power as a major alternative to fossil fuel-based power. But by the 1980s and early 1990s, the country had lost its appetite for the fuel source. It was seen as dangerous, too closely related to nuclear weapons, and too productive of nuclear waste, and gradually, the number of working nuclear power plants got smaller and smaller. In many places, in fact, the mere mention of nuclear power will draw a dirty stare.
But in Arco, there is still a civic pride associated with the events of 1955, and today, there is a growing national enthusiasm for the idea that back then, in the heart of the Cold War, seemed so novel: turning to nuclear power as a major source of energy.
Nowhere, perhaps, is that enthusiasm more palpable than at the Idaho National Lab (INL), the U.S. Department of Energy's lead nuclear research institution. Located in and around Idaho Falls, Idaho, INL is at the forefront of developing the technology that could bring nuclear back to the grownups' table, and the researchers there--and clearly, some policymakers in Washington, D.C., as well--feel that nuclear is our best bet for providing a good deal of the power needs of both the general population and industry, while at the same time keeping the carbon footprint small.
I visited INL this week as part of Road Trip 2009, and was given the lowdown on why nuclear is thought to be a better energy alternative than ever before, and why the public shouldn't worry about the kinds of safety concerns that were so prevalent after high-profile reactor accidents at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania in 1979 and in Chernobyl in the Soviet Union in 1986.
My first stop was for a visit with Phillip Finck, INL's associate director for nuclear science and technology (see video below).
Finck explained that the genesis of his lab, which was formed about four years ago, was a feeling that a nuclear renaissance is coming, driven both by a need for new dependable sources of energy and by major climate concerns.
The vision behind the lab, he continued, is to figure out how to address America's carbon dioxide problems with nuclear. Today, roughly one-third of our domestic power output goes into electricity production, a third into transportation and a third into industrial, home heating, and other applications. Of that total output, nearly 85 percent comes from fossil fuels, while only 6 percent to 7 percent comes from hydropower and an equal amount from nuclear. A very small amount comes from other sources, such as biomass, he added.
As a result, the thinking is that nuclear can be a significant part of the solution, and in several ways.
The first, he explained, would be the building of new nuclear power plants; the second, the extension of the lifetimes of the 104 existing nuclear plants in the country; and the third would be using existing--and new--plants to produce new processed heats and liquid fuels that could replace existing carbon-based fuels.
Of course, there would still be the question of how to deal with the nuclear waste from the plants, but Finck said that is also something INL is working hard on. To begin with, INL is looking into ways to make existing reactors produce less waste, and at the same time, the lab, and other research facilities, are working on technologies designed to take spent fuels and through the process of transmutation, reduce their toxicity. The latter would mean, he added, that it could be possible to reuse much of the radioactive waste and reduce the toxicity of the eventual waste by a factor of up to 100.
What this all means is that the time has come, Finck continued, to pursue the development of what he called fourth-generation nuclear power plants. This is a growing research field that is being worked on in as many as 12 countries around the world, including the U.S., Japan, France, and China, all of which are working together to make these next-generation reactors possible.
The criteria of these new reactors are simple, Finck said: they would need to be cheaper, be more sustainable--meaning that they would produce less waste; have constantly improving safety standards; and would have improved proliferation resistance--meaning they would have less and less applicability for nuclear weapons.
Today, this is all in the research stage, but according to Finck, it's possible that the first fourth-generation plant could come online sometime around 2020.
In the meantime, however, there are factors that make even today's nuclear reactors more of a solution for our national energy problems than ever before, he said. To begin with, the operating and safety performance of the nation's plants have never been higher. There haven't been any notable safety problems in the U.S. since Three Mile Island, Finck said, and today, plants are operating at 92 percent efficiency, meaning that they are online 92 percent of the time.
And that has come as a result of better-than-ever training and discipline and means that existing plants are producing power at the equivalent of several entirely new plants, just from that increased efficiency, he argued.
Hydrogen Production
My next stop was to visit with Stephen Herring, the technical director for High Temperature Electrolysis in the Energy Department's office of nuclear energy nuclear hydrogen initiative.
Herring and his team are working on a number of experiments, but their major purpose is to develop methods, using nuclear reactors, of producing hydrogen as a way of improving the quality of existing liquid fuels and to produce more liquid fuels with zero, or at least much less usage of carbon dioxide.
As well, Herring's lab is all about looking for technical answers to problems raised by industry and then finding out, from industry, if they're on the right track.
At the next facility, the Fuel Conditioning Facility, I was shown a series of what are called "hot cells," which are highly radioactive areas behind five feet and nine layers of lead glass.
One of the first things I saw in the hot cells was a series of spent fuel rods from INL's Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR II), which was a formerly working reactor closed down by congressional decree in 1994.
If someone were to go inside the room, my host for the day, Don Miley, said, they "wouldn't see the sun go down. So we're not going in there."
In a similar facility, the Hot Fuel Examination Facility, we saw a different set of hot cells, this time behind four feet of glass, but no less dangerous on the other side (see video below). There, David Petti, the director of the Very High Temperature Reactor (VHTR) technology development office, explained that his program is to work on a gas reactor, a "passively safe reactor" that is cooled with helium, and which has a reactor core made of graphite, and which is "tall and skinny" at 28 meters high and 8 meters wide.
Because it's graphite, which absorbs heat, he explained, it's resilient to accidents. That would mean that even in the case of an accident, it would take hundreds of hours to overheat.
"The joke," Petti said, is that in the case of an accident, "the operators could go to lunch, dinner and breakfast before having to figure out what to do."
Developed after Three Mile Island, the VHTR uses a unique kind of fuel: half-inch diameter and inch-long pellets made from huge numbers of compacted microscopic uranium particles covered in three layers of carbon and silicon carbine and then coated in graphite. The pellets, Petti explained, can take heats up to 1600 degrees Celsius without failing.
Inside the reactor, there are millions of these pellets, as well as tennis-ball sized spheres called "pebbles," and when bombarded with neutrons, they fission and create heat.
But the carbon covering the particles protects the uranium up to temperatures of 3,000 degrees Celsius, and the reactor is designed, he said, not to get above 1,600 degrees. "Everything is designed from that worst-case accident," he said, "so heat is always moved, and so it never gets that hot."
Looking into the cooling pond at the Idaho National Labs Advanced Test Reactor, it is possible to see a blue glow coming off of nuclear fuel stored below, which is based on the Cherenkov Effect.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Another goal, he said, is to increase what is called "burnup," or how much of the fission is used for getting power on the grid. Today's water-cooled plants have a burnup rate of around 5 percent, he said, but at the INL's Advanced Test Reactor, they're working on getting that number up to 19 percent.
The idea, then, is to use the VHTR to prove the model and then begin building out similar reactors for use in industry. Ideally, then, companies like Chevron and Dow would license such plants in order to produce heat at constant cost and low carbon footprint, Petti said. And such a buildout of new reactors would make a big difference, he added, because a company like Dow has the same level of hydrocarbon usage as a country like Kuwait.
National Scientific User Facility
The last stop of the day was at the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR), a fully functional reactor that is used in large part by the Navy for a series of experiments, as well as by universities and government and industry researchers.
A big part of the ATR's mission is as the National Scientific User Facility, under which university researchers submit proposals for time in the reactor to conduct experiments. At any given time, there might be about 45 different experiments underway.
And one of the biggest utilities of the ATR is that because its core is geared towards giving every experiment exposure to as many neutrons as they need, it serves as somewhat of a "time machine," explained Frances Marshall, the ATR experiment program manager. That means, she said, that because neutrons erode metals, researchers can see a 20x aging effect on the metals in their experiments due to the bombardment of neutrons inside ATR.
Ultimately, it's too early to know whether the nation and the world will get behind a re-emergence of nuclear power plants as a major energy source. But at INL, the researchers and scientists there are making the argument that such facilities are both safe and energy and cost effective.
If true, a lot more towns like Arco, Idaho could someday see their power provided by nuclear reactors. In the short term, though, the world is hungry for new clean power, and a lot of people think the best answer is nuclear.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
What is this yellow sphere? Tell me and you could win a nice giveaway.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)ARCO, Idaho--Every day on Road Trip 2009, I'm seeing eye-catching things I've never seen before. And every day, I'm seeing things that I'm familiar with that still manage to make me smile, or laugh, or shake my head.
And so, as you might guess--or have seen if you've read any of the stories I've written or photo galleries I've posted during the last two and a half weeks--I've been taking a whole lot of pictures. Nearly 4,000, so far, in fact.
From now until Road Trip is over, I will do my very best to post a daily photo and ask a question about it. If you're the first person to answer the question correctly, or provide the information I'm looking for, then I'll offer you a nice gift in return.
For Wednesday, I want to know what this yellow sphere is. Walking through this tiny town near the Craters of the Moon, I saw two of them on a back street. I have a theory on what they might be, but I thought it would be fun to hear your ideas. After all, when I posted a photo of an extremely cool, steampunk-looking object from Utah two years ago, I got plenty of answers, including many that were spot on.
So, e-mail me at daniel--dot--terdiman--at--cnet--dot--com and let's hear your ideas on what this is. And then please stay tuned for the Road Trip picture of the day throughout the rest of the project.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest, and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
ARCO, Idaho--For almost a year, I've owned an iPhone 3G. I've done lots of things with it and loaded a lot of apps on it. But now, Apple has released the iPhone 3GS, and it's got new features--including a compass, voice commands, video recording, and auto-focus.
This iPhone 3GS has only one new app on it. I want to learn about the best apps that specifically take advantage of 3GS features. If you are the first one to suggest an app I try and keep, you win a prize.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Luckily for me, I'm on Road Trip 2009 and am testing a number of gadgets, including an iPhone 3GS that Apple lent me for my journeys through Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, and Colorado.
I've already downloaded Brushes, the amazing painting app that was used to draw the cover of a recent issue of The New Yorker. But that's all I've got. What I want are the best apps that specifically leverage the new features available only on the 3GS.
And so I'm asking: do you have a favorite? If so, let me know. Over the next few days, I'll be trying out a number of apps on this iPhone, and if you're the first one to suggest an app--paid or free--that I download and keep, I'll send a nice little gift your way.
Remember, I'm not interested in things for the iPhone in general. Well, I am, but in this case, I only want to know your thoughts on apps that have been designed with the 3GS in mind. They can, however, be apps that have updated features available only on the new phone.
If you'd like to send me an idea, please do so at daniel--dot--terdiman--at--cnet--dot--com by Monday, July 13, and include "iPhone 3GS app" in your subject line. If it's an app you designed, I may still try it, but you won't be eligible for a giveaway.
Please help me make the iPhone 3GS more interesting. I look forward to your suggestions.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
Road Trip 2009 is looking for your suggestions for what to do this Thursday in Boise, Idaho. If you are the one to make a suggestion that I use, I have a cool prize for you.
(Credit: Boise Convention and Visitors Bureau)IDAHO FALLS, Idaho--What should I do in Boise?
I'm on my Road Trip 2009 project, and am headed toward the Idaho capital. But the plan I had in place for Boise this Thursday looks like it's falling through, and I'm hoping you can help me figure out an alternative.
So far on Road Trip 2009, I've written stories and put together photo galleries about a wide variety of topics, including green building; preparing for a post peak-oil world; starting out at the Air Force Academy; the current state of Cheyenne Mountain; the incredible canyons, arches, and buttes of southeastern Utah (and northeastern Arizona); Army defenses against chemical and biological weapons; incredible earthworks; giant Air Force bombing ranges; and the building of the next generation of NASA rockets.
That should give you a sense of the breadth of things I look for in putting together Road Trip, and what would work for me in, or near, Boise.
If you have a suggestion for something I can do in the area that will work for this Thursday and that no one else has mentioned first, I'd be happy to reward you with a choice of a DVD set or a video game or two. But regardless of the opportunity for prizes, I'm hoping you might have an idea or two for me based on your desire to see something really cool get a little bit of exposure.
Please let me know as soon as you can if you have an idea to share. You can e-mail me at daniel--dot--terdiman--at--cnet--dot--com. Or you can send it to me via Twitter or Facebook. I look forward to hearing from you.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest, and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
The rear section of the first-ever completed Ares I solid rocket booster, which will be test-fired on Aug. 25. This signifies a major milestone for NASA's Constellation program, which will replace the Space Shuttle program, and which is intended to send humans back to the moon.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)PROMONTORY, Utah--"This is the world's biggest solid rocket motor."
Those eight words, with which Kevin Rees described the Ares 1 rocket to me on Monday, are at once entirely understated, and hugely consequential. Rees is the director of test services for ATK, the primary rocket contractor on NASA's Constellation program.
Since 1981, the Space Shuttle has been NASA's main program. But now, with just a few more Shuttle launches left, the space agency--and the huge ecosystem of contractors who support it--are seriously turning their attention to Constellation, the next program. Constellation is expected to take Americans back to the moon, and may someday take them to Mars. And like the Apollo and Mercury programs in the 1960s and '70s, Constellation is designed with a crew capsule that will be placed on top of a giant rocket--in this case, the Ares I.
And here before me, in what can be described as essentially a huge shed at ATK's massive complex about two hours north of Salt Lake City, the first of those rockets is resting on its side, awaiting its first moment of glory, a planned August 25 test-firing.
Though the Ares I has been on the drawing board for some time, and many people have seen imagery of it, no reporter has ever seen one fully assembled. As part of my Road Trip 2009 project, I had the honor of being the first, and of sharing the first pictures with you.
The Ares I rocket is a five-segment behemoth, fully 154 feet long. By comparison, the Space Shuttle used two four-segment rockets, each of which was 126 feet long. But lest you think that an entirely new program means entirely new equipment, think again.
I was told throughout my visit to ATK that every effort is being made to reuse components from the Space Shuttle program. And that's why every single 12.2-foot-wide cylinder used to make this first Ares rocket--known as DM 1, or developmental motor 1--has been recycled from previous Shuttle missions. Indeed, the various components that make up DM 1 have been used in 48 different Shuttle launches.
Still, it's not as if the pieces are just picked up out of the ocean and thrown back into the rotation. Rather, they are painstakingly reconditioned and made ready for reuse, as they have been throughout the Shuttle program. That's one way NASA has kept costs down during the program, and how it intends to do so going forward into Constellation.
The reason it's possible for ATK to reuse segments from Shuttle launches in the Ares program is that Ares rockets have a lot in common with those used in the Shuttle program. To be sure, the Shuttle used two boosters, and didn't have a capsule installed on top, while Constellation will comprise a single booster with an Orion crew capsule on top. But the boosters will be very similar, beginning with their exact same width and segment dimensions.
There will be some differences, however.
For example, the insulation on the interior of the cylinders is different on the Ares segments than it was with the Shuttle, and one big reason is an effort to be better stewards of the environment than in the past. For instance, the insulation of the Shuttle segments used asbestos, while the Ares segments have done away with that poisonous material.
'A little bit of melancholy'
But as demonstrated by the fact that the segments in DM 1 have been into space so many times as part of the Shuttle program, there is a heavy emphasis on reuse. Even the ATK professionals couldn't always tell right away whether a segment that was being worked on was for the Shuttle or for Ares.
At one point in my visit, we passed by a spot where sections were being put together to make segments for what, apparently, will be the very last Shuttle mission. While nothing around the work there signaled this momentous detail, it's clear that the folks at ATK are well aware of it.
Artist's rendering of the Ares I crew launch vehicle during ascent.
(Credit: NASA/MSFC)"There's a little bit of melancholy" about it, said one of my hosts, Gregg Kotter, program director for the Ares I First Stage Five-step motor program. Still, whatever sadness the people here feel seems more than offset by the excitement at being part of what NASA clearly hopes will be its standard-bearing program for another 30 years or so.
Yet the Shuttle work is still very much in evidence. One stop on my ATK tour was to the propellant mixing facilities where it was explained to me how the crews here make the solid fuel that is used to light the Shuttle--and soon, the Ares--rockets.
We weren't able to go inside the facility to see the systems because it was a Monday, and on Mondays they are mixing propellant. From a safety standpoint, I can see why they don't want visitors in a facility where someone is actively mixing a fuel that can launch a Space Shuttle.
But again, given that ATK here is working simultaneously on both Shuttle and Ares, my hosts had no way to know which program was getting the propellant being worked on while we were there.
And when asked which program the fuel was for, a technician gave about as simple an answer as he could: "Shuttle."
We did get to talk a fair bit about how the propellant mixing is done, and one thing was clear: It takes a whole lot of fuel to get a giant rocket off the ground. Each segment of the rocket requires 40 giant (600-gallon) mixing bowls full of propellant, which is made up of a binding agent polymer; iron oxide, a burn catalyst; aluminum powder, the fuel source; an epoxy bonding and curing agent; and ammonium perchlorate.
When mixed, it becomes a true solid. I'd heard the term "solid fuel" before, but had never really understood what it meant. In fact, it's just what it sounds like: A fuel that, as I saw inside a small device called an igniter--which is placed at the top of the rocket--looks like plastic, and which is very much a solid. In fact, it's brown, flexible and cool to the touch.
Once mixed, the propellant is cured for 44 hours, and then applied to the interior surface of the rocket segments, where it is then cured for another 52 hours.
After the rocket segments are fully assembled and filled with propellant, they are then put through an X-ray and ultrasonic inspection to make sure they don't have any bubbles in them. If they do, Kotter told me, they can either be rejected altogether--which is an extremely unpopular option--or technicians can try to assess the problem and see if it can be fixed. It wasn't clear how often this happens.
Gentlemen, start your engine
For the teams getting ready for the August 25 Ares I test-fire, it has been a long time coming. Some members, Rees said, have been working on this for more than two years.
Once everything is in place, the ignition of the rocket--which will be laid flat on its side and will shoot its massive blasts of fire back into a giant pit of sand and rock--is an extremely fast process. First, a pellet is dropped into the igniter--a small device that is larger than the tactical motor on a lot of rockets, and which has 300 pounds of propellant inside--which will then set off the main rocket bore. From zero to full thrust takes 600 milliseconds.
Assuming the test goes well, it will only be a matter of time before ATK starts shipping rocket segments, one at a time, to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where they will eventually be assembled into a rocket that the space agency will launch into space. Those segments will be put on trains that will take ten days or so to cross the country before they reach Kennedy.
And if you were to see one of them on the road, you wouldn't be able to tell if they were for the Shuttle or for Ares. But if you happened to have a chance to ask someone in the know which they were for, there's a good possibility they'd give you a one-word answer: "Shuttle" or "Ares."
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
CNET News reporter Daniel Terdiman experienced noteworthy call continuity with his iPhone 3G in Ogden, Utah, on Sunday.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)OGDEN, Utah--I love my iPhone, but usually, I try not to depend on it keeping a phone call active for that long if I'm moving around much.
But on Sunday, I had what I thought was a noteworthy session of iPhone continuity. On my Road Trip 2009 project, I was here in Ogden, Utah, nestled at the base of the Wasatch Mountains, about an hour north of Salt Lake City.
It was a stunningly beautiful day, and Ogden features hiking trails that go straight up into the canyons of these first few miles of the Wasatches. So I drove the Audi Q7 TDI clean diesel SUV I'm testing up to a parking lot at a trailhead, grabbed some gear, and headed into the hills.
On Road Trip, I'm loaded down with cool gear that I'm testing out, but on this hike, I didn't bring any of it. All I brought was my own personal iPhone 3G and an old Canon PowerShot SD1000.
From the get-go, the iPhone was operating like a champ. It was getting a full 3G signal, allowing me to load up and listen to a terrific 39-minute interview on NPR's "Fresh Air" of John Mellencamp as I walked deeper into a wonderful canyon shrouded with trees and with a slightly ascending trail alongside a small, beautiful creek.
All the while, the iPhone kept the full 3G signal, and even when I had been in the forest for 20 minutes or so, the device was still seamlessly playing back "Fresh Air."
To be sure, the orientation of the canyon trail was a big player here. These mountains are on top of Ogden, a wide, flat city. And so I had easy, line-of-sight access to the 3G signal AT&T was putting out. Still, I've never had that good a signal that deep into a forest before, and I've been on plenty of such trails within sight of San Francisco.
Finally, it was time to head back, though, and as I did, I made a phone call. I was still in the forest, so I didn't really expect it to work, but it went right through. I started having my conversation. I emerged from the woods to a glorious vista of city below and mountains behind, and the signal was strong. Eventually, I made it back to the Q7, all the while still talking on the phone, and got into the car.
I was using my regular iPhone headphones, but when I turned on the engine and removed the headset, the call shifted over, without my having had to do anything, to the Q7's built-in hands-free Bluetooth phone integration. I kept on talking as I drove to my hotel.
When I got there, I turned the car off, put the headset back in, and the call was still active. Again, without my having to do anything. I grabbed my stuff, walked into my hotel, and went up the staircase. Eventually, a few twists and turns through a long hallway later, I opened the door to my room and put my things down. Except the phone. I was still on my call.
Amazing.
And why is it amazing? I mean, after all, it's just several systems doing what they're supposed to, right? Well, that's just it. In my past experience, I would never have predicted that this phone call could continue, from when I first dialed it to when I got to my room, without losing the signal at least once or probably twice.
So what's the lesson? Maybe, despite constantly being let down by it, I should have more faith in technology. It's not often that everything works the way it's supposed to, but when it does, it's actually pretty cool.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
A MUTE, or multiple threat emitter simulator, which is designed to throw up electronic challenges to pilots attempting bombing missions at the Utah Test & Training Range.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)DUGWAY, Utah--"We train warriors and test weapons."
That's how Col. Jeff Snell, the commander of the 388th Range Squadron, which operates the gargantuan Utah Test & Training Range (UTTR), summed up the main mission of his command.
I had spent the day visiting part of UTTR's Maryland-size facilities, and discovered that Snell's words were a very succinct way of explaining what really goes on at the range: Air Force pilots fly in there in screaming-fast aircraft to run bombing training missions, often in advance of deployments to either Iraq or Afghanistan, and, less frequently, the Air Force uses the facility to test out various weapons systems.
Unless you knew it was there, you wouldn't know it was there. There is so much desert in northwest Utah, much of it with small, Afghanistan-like mountains, that except in very rare cases, the public never goes anywhere near UTTR. And that means that pilots flying missions there have almost unfettered scope for firing away at their targets, often with live bombs or missiles.
Indeed, unlike other bombing ranges around the country, all of which limit the direction in which missiles can be fired, UTTR offers the Air Force no such limitations. Instead, the property is so big that in most cases, there is nothing to stop pilots from firing any which way they please.
As part of my Road Trip 2009 project, I was given a tour of part of UTTR by Maj. David Dunklee, the detachment commander there. He explained that his team--mainly made up of civilians--have four main tasks: setting up and refurbishing targets; photographing missions, with centimeter accuracy; challenging pilots on missions with all manner of electronic threats in attempts to make the missions as realistic as possible; and basic infrastructure management.
While the first and the last of those duties are probably the most time-consuming, the most complex parts are the middle two: photography and challenging pilots during their missions.
The point of the photography component is to record every last bit of data about each and every mission that is run at UTTR, and that's a big number. According to Snell, there are about 15,000 sorties a year at UTTR, most of which are training runs. Pilots will fly all kinds of aircraft there, including the politically controversial F-22, B-1s, B-2s, F-15Es, and others.
Scattered around UTTR are small white domes called cine-theodolites. These are camera batteries in which operators are able, through very high-powered lenses, to capture imagery of elements of bombing missions, and, when combined with at least two and, ideally, three other Cine-Ts, as they're called, Dunklee's people can triangulate and create a "centimeter accuracy" record of what went on during a mission.
And that's important, because the critical part of the missions that are run at UTTR is giving decision makers, pilots and others involved in the Air Force, a way to see exactly went right and what went wrong during a mission, or with a test weapon, so that they can determine the pilot, or the weapon, are ready for prime time.
This is called "scoring" the missions, and with more than 300 targets scattered all over UTTR, it is important that Dunklee's team have infrastructure in place where and when it's needed so that every mission can be scored.
Realistic conditions
But pilots wouldn't get much out of running training bombing missions if they had free and clear access at their targets. That's why another task of the Dunklee's people is to run interference, and to, essentially, be the "bad guys," as John Bridgman, a quality assurance operator, put it. To that end, Bridgman and his colleagues are given control of systems that can transmit many different kind of threats that pilots will have to contend with as they scream over UTTR in their aircraft.
Several drones that will be used as unmanned flying targets for the pilots attempting missions at the range.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Those threats can be anything that a pilot might encounter in actual combat: shoulder-launched missiles, surface-to-air missiles, other airplanes and so on. "We throw everything we can at them," Bridgman said, trying to simulate shooting them down.
Additionally, Bridgman's team moves its equipment around so that they can "attack" from anywhere, making it impossible for pilots to learn where the threats, of which there are at least 75 different kinds, might be coming from.
Another element of presenting pilots with realistic conditions is giving them moving targets. Already, UTTR has two autonomous tanks that are capable of pulling targets around on trailers at slow speeds. But now, the Air Force is preparing to roll out a new system, a GPS and transmitter-geared-up Ford F-350 truck that is designed to pull a target around without a driver at 55 miles an hour.
The truck cost the Air Force more than $100,000, Dunklee estimated, so it's crucial that pilots not hit it. But with precision weapons, and long trailers, no one is too worried about losing the pricey vehicle to a rogue bomb. Rather, they hope, pilots will hit the inexpensive targets placed on the trailer.
At UTTR, there are other target scenarios going on than just pilots firing directly at targets. Those types of missions are intended mainly as training for the pilots. But there are also test of weapons systems such as cruise missiles. In that case, pilots of bombers like a B-52 will fly into UTTR and fire such a missile, which, in an attempt to simulate the up to four hours of flight time it might have in combat, will proceed to "spaghetti" overhead until finally zeroing on its target.
Back at Mission Control
The command center for UTTR is at Hill Air Force Base, which is north of Salt Lake City and about a two-hour drive from UTTR. There, Snell and his team, as well as any of a wide range of "customers," including personnel from the Air Force, other military services, the Defense Department, defense contractors and others can watch the missions play out in real time, thanks to Dunklee's photography team.
The various tracking systems deployed at UTTR allow those in the command center to see very accurate and up-to-the-minute data about the missions, giving them the ability to understand precisely what is happening at any given moment and, later, to make decisions based on that information.
And while the most common mission of Snell's 388th Range Squadron is training pilots who are headed for combat, it is also to evaluate new weapons systems.
In August, then, the 388th will begin a weapons systems evaluation program (WSEP) that will last for three weeks. Personnel involved in the evaluation will begin to show up at Hill up to a couple weeks early for preparation. A WSEP, Snell said, is designed to produce an end-to-end examination of a weapons program, of everyone involved in it, and of their ability to react to conditions on the ground.
All told, given how many people are involved, both at UTTR and at Hill, how many bombs are dropped annually and how many sorties are flown there, it's amazing that the Air Force is able to pull it all off without the general public even knowing it is going on in their backyard.
But that's the advantage provided by a piece of land that is protected by mountains on several sides and which is the size of the state of Maryland. And while there have certainly been deadly cases of miscalculation in airborne attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Air Force feels that those who train at UTTR are as well-prepared as a pilot can be before heading off into combat.
On June 22, Geek Gestalt will kick off Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be looking for the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
A view of Spiral Jetty, Robert Smithson's masterpiece earthwork, which is on the north side of the Great Salt Lake, about two-and-a-half hours from Salt Lake City.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)ROZEL POINT, Utah--From afar, it's hard to tell what it is. And even as you approach it, it's not clear exactly how special it is.
Yet, walking through Spiral Jetty, artist Robert Smithson's masterpiece earthwork, which juts out into the north side of the Great Salt Lake, reveals the extent of its glory.
A 1,500-foot-long spiral built in 1970, Spiral Jetty has, over the years, disappeared under higher waters on the Great Lake, only to appear again. These days, the thousands of volcanic basalt rocks that make up the piece are fully there, though they don't stick up as high out of the water as they did in the beginning.
I got a chance during my Road Trip 2009 project to be shown Spiral Jetty by Salt Lake City art historian Hikmet Loe, an expert on the piece I was put in touch with by the Dia Art Foundation, which manages Spiral Jetty. We visited it on a gorgeous day, accompanied only by a few other people and scores of soaring pelicans. For years, Loe has been giving talks on Spiral Jetty, leading tours to it and, more recently, working on a book about the earthwork.
An earthwork, according to Loe, is a large-scale artwork that is "built on the land with materials of the land, and brings consciousness to the place that you might not otherwise have because you might not go to that place if it weren't there."
In the case of Spiral Jetty, all of that is no doubt true. The piece is close to the Golden Spike National Historic Site, the spot where in 1869, the Union Pacific Railroad finally met up with the Central Pacific Railroad, forming the first Transcontinental Railroad. But if the Spiral Jetty weresn't there, it's unlikely many people would drive out to this remote spot more than two hours from Salt Lake City.
Walking out on the rocks, with your feet moving across soft salt crystals, is an exercise in beauty. Before you is the vastness of the Great Salt Lake, the Wasatch Mountains, several other mountain peaks, a huge sky, seemingly ecstatic birds, and an amazing work of art.
It's not enough to view it from above. It takes walking slowly around the arms of the spiral to get even the smallest sense of what Smithson had in mind. Yet for years, no one had even that much chance.
As Loe writes in a book chapter on the piece, "It is a permanent installation in a lake that continually covers it up, only to reveal it every few years to travelers seeking art in a desert."
Not long ago, Spiral Jetty's future became uncertain for a different reason.
In 2008, a Canadian oil and gas company called Pearl Montana Exploration and Production filed an application to do exploratory drilling in the Great Salt Lake, potentially as close as 3.5 miles from the earthwork. "The drilling itself, as well as any subsequent oil extraction," reads a note on the Spiral Jetty Web site, "could disrupt the artwork's viewshed, compromise the physical integrity of Smithson's extraordinary sculpture, upset the area's isolated character, and degrade the natural environment of the Lake."
Subsequent public outcry, however, seems to have colored the state of Utah's view of the application, and the state turned it down. And while Pearl Montana may resubmit the application, the Web site reads, for now, it has no specific plans to do so.
Building a masterpiece
Building Spiral Jetty took just six days, an amazing fact when you consider that it required 6,650 tons of earth and basalt, which were taken from nearby--though workers took pains, on Smithson's orders, to cover up and clean the site the rocks and earth were taken from. "The use of massive caterpillars and huge dump trucks, while standard equipment for the time, lent an air of antiquity to the project," Loe wrote. "In the film 'Spiral Jetty,' Smithson romanticizes the monstrous quality of the machinery by comparing them to dinosaurs such as the Tyrannosaurus Rex.
I don't know about that, but I will say that walking out on Spiral Jetty, with little more sound than that of the wind and a few birds, was a chance to take part in something worldly. It was a chance to be out in the lake, on my feet, in a way that would otherwise be very unlikely. And it was an opportunity to participate in art in a way that's not usually possible. It reminded me, in some ways, of the Grand Canyon Skywalk, another masterpiece that takes you out into something that normally you just look at from the edge.
If you're not in the Salt Lake City area, and even if you are, it's a trek to get to Spiral Jetty. But I can't think of a better way to spend a day.
For the next several weeks, Geek Gestalt will be on Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be writing about and photographing the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota and Colorado. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
