As we near the fourth quarter, my thoughts have started to turn to planning for next year. 2010 has been, and continues to be, a year focused on organizational/information technology infrastructure. There has been good progress in these areas, enough that I would like to see Mach 30 use 2011 to begin working on hardware projects, specifically the very small scale engineering projects I have started to call “kites”. This idea has started to gel as the Incorporation Task Force works to complete the IRS 1023 application for 501(c)3 status.
The 2011 budget forecast we have prepared for the 1023 includes funding for three Tier 1 kites, which begs the question, what kind of projects might those be, and how will we go about building and flying them. Here are some random thoughts on those questions.
I found an outstanding series of videos from an unlikely advocate of human spaceflight. Steven Colbert’s series called “Fall Back Position: Astronaut” chronicals his experience as he goes through “astronaut training” at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX. Colbert has also contacted the astrnauts onboard the ISS during a live press conference. here’s the links to some videos: