Three Utah Schools Installing Starship Simulator InfiniD Labs. Seventeen Simulators in Utah! 50 Years Ago in Space. The Imaginarium.

From InfiniD's Website

Welcome Elk Ridge Middle School, Early Light Academy, and Edgemont Elementary to the InfiniD Group of Starship Simulators

     InfiniD is pleased to welcome Elk Ridge Middle School, Early Light Academy, and Edgemont Elementary into the growing community of schools using InfiniD Lab starship simulators.   Elk Ridge Middle School is in the Jordan School District and located in South Jordan, Utah.  

     InfiniD Labs basically morph a school's computer lab into a futuristic starship simulator.  Elk Ridge's simulator will be used to enhance the school's 7th grade curriculum.  

     Early Light Academy is also located in South Jordan.  It is a public charter school with grades K - 9.  This school's InfiniD Lab will be used to enhance the school's fourth grade curriculum.  Zeddy Nelson, one of our illustratious Voyager Club members, is a 9th grader at Early Light and is helping Skyler Carr install the Lab.  He's excited to have a simulator in his own school and plans on training to flight direct the missions.  

     Edgemont Elementary School is part of the Provo School District.  This school's InfiniD Lab will be used as part of the entire school's curriculum for grades K through 6.  

     All three computer lab simulators will be up and running this Fall; bringing the total number of starship simulators in Utah, inspired by the experiential education method I pioneered thirty years ago, to seventeen. 

The Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center:  Four Simulators

Lakeview Academy: Three simulators

Canyon Grove Academy: Two Simulators

Renaissance Academy: One Simulator

Merit Academy: Two Simulators

InfiniD's Mobile Simulator Titan

iWorlds Mobile Simulator Valiant

Edgemont Elementary's InfiniD Lab

Elk Ridge School's InfiniD Lab

Early Light Academy's InfiniD Lab

     This video introduces you to the InfiniD Lab

     This video shows you an InfiniD Lab in action!

     

Visit InfiniD's website to learn how an InfiniD Lab can change education at your school.   

50 Years Ago in Space: Gemini 11

by Mark Daymont

Spacerubble.blogspot.com

Beautiful blast-off of Gemini 11 on the Titan II rocket.

Just fifty years ago, astronauts Pete Conrad and Richard (Dick) Gordon lifted off from the LC-19 pad at Cape Kennedy, Florida.  The flight took place just an hour and a half after the blast-off of an Atlas-Agena mission from LC-14.

Atlas rocket carrying an Agena docking spacecraft lifts off from pad LC-14.

Busy times at the Cape. While Gemini 11 lifts off LC-19, in the distance you can see SA-500F, a dummy Saturn V rocket used to test the launch facilities of Pad LC-39A before actual missions begin.

A close-up view of the Gemini 11 Launch.

In a Gemini first, the manned capsule caught up to the Agena target vehicle 94 minutes after launch and docked without problems. The rapid flight to the docking vehicle was termed "direct ascent" rendezvous and docking, and is similar to the short 6-hour Soyuz flights used today for astronauts to reach the ISS in a minimal time. Once docked, the astronauts used the motor aboard the Agena to propel them into a higher record altitude of 850 miles, more than four times higher than the ISS orbits these days.

NASA publicity shot of Richard Gordon (L), and Pete Conrad (R).

The astronauts did not stay in the higher orbit. They docked and undocked a total of four times during the mission, and lowered their main orbital height to about 184 miles up. They then prepared for the main experiment of the mission, to simulate some artificial gravity using a spinning of the combined spaceships.

At a press conference, Pete Conrad uses models of the Gemini and Agena spacecraft to demonstrate how the tether between the vehicle would be used to keep the craft together while spinning around an axis point.

In the first mission EVA, Richard Gordon exited the Gemini capsule to attach a tether between the two vehicles. During the two hour plan for the spacewalk, he needed to move over to the Agena's docking collar and remove the 100-meter tether, then attach it to the prepared points on the Agena dock and the Gemini nose. Unfortunately, the activities of the EVA turned out to be much more fatiguing and problematic than the training had suggest it would be. The EVA had to be shortened, but Gordon successfully connected the tether.

Picture of Gordon preparing to exit the Gemini spacecraft.

Image of Gordon moving between the two spacecraft. Most of the footage of Gordon outside the craft, taken by Conrad, was of poor quality because of poor visibility in his window. 

The slack in the tether is very apparent in this image taken by Gordon.

The tether experiment did not go as planned. They were never able to get the taught tether stability needed to fully generate a proper rotation, but the spinning they were able to achieve gave them a measurable amount of centrifugal force.  Later, in a second EVA, Gordon was able to perform a non-tiring series of experiments and photography sessions.

High-quality image of Australia from Gemini 11.

Moonrise over the curvature of the Earth.

Three days after launch, the mission ended in a great example of the advances America was making with computer technology. In the first fully-computerized automatic re-entry, the Gemini 11 spacecraft precisely landed only 2.8 miles from its planned position, close by the recovery ship USS Guam.

USS Guam alongside the spacecraft and recovery frogmen.

Gordon and Conrad on the deck of USS Guam.

An interesting photo I found comparing the size difference between the two-man Gemini spacecraft and the original one-astronaut Mercury space capsule. Keep in mind that the white-colored service module section behind the Gemini astronauts did not return to Earth with the capsule but were destroyed after separation and re-entry

The Imaginarium

 

     

The Voyager Club's Lion Squadron, Bruised, Battered, and Missing... The Last Video Footage from the Lion Squadron. Jon is Confused. The Time Lords. Theater Imaginarium.

The last received photo of the Lion Squadron. Sloppy First Aid indicates injuries exceeding Sick Bay's tolerances.  Notice one bandage tourniquet used for two crewmen's injuries.  The photo's tint hints of fire on the bridge

     The Troubadour's reporter at Starfleet reports another Voyager Club squadron went missing on Saturday in the line of duty.  The Lion Squadron, investigating the terrorist attack on Starbase 10, last reported they were in pursuit of the terrorist and taking heavy fire.  As to why the crew would gather for a photo on the Magellan's bridge in the heat of battle either shows an acknowledgement of the inevitable or a complete loss of Captain Alex's marbles.

     This photo shows the Lion Squadron at red alert.  Commander Orion is seen at the Chief of Ops station eavesdropping on the conversation Lt. Dakota is having with confused folks in control of the ship's oxygen generators; which, like the CO2 scrubbers, have a hairline tolerance for vibrations, brownouts, or changes in air pressure - all of which are the results of battle. Orion was listed as the Magellan's sensors officer.  The sensors station is in the photo's forefront.  
     While many officers have pictures of their families in their work areas, Orion chooses to display a photo of his pet something or another.  The creature appears mammalian, but as to its planet of origin, your guess is as good as any.       
     Starfleet Command's Deep Space Communications Network triangulated on a faint signal emanating from the USS Magellan's last reported location. The signal required several boosters to download and three levels of command clearances before it was released to the concerned public. That last video from the Lion Squadron on the USS Magellan is here for your careful examination.

     The Phoenix White and Lion Squadrons are officially listed as missing in action. Candlelight vigils are being organized along with remembrances of the crews.


Jon Parker's Understandable Confusion 

      
     Jon Parker, Space Center Assistant Director, is confused and is asking the many Troubadours out there who may understand the publishing world for help.  This is one of the many textbooks required for Jon's coursework at Utah Valley State University.  Please make note the book's title, then find the book's author's listed at the top of the front cover.  Then, look back at the title.  Notice something odd?  Now you understand the look on Jon's face.  
     This university thing is a challenge for most young adults, but why complicated things more than they already are with curriculum written by people who had nothing to do with its writing?  Jon plans to take them matter up with his advisor. If satisfaction isn't given, he will take it to the university president and demand an answer. Jon is unforgiving in matters such as these.  

The Time Lords Synchronize their Instruments to Coordinated Universal Time    

     Gallifreyans Ian and Mason were kindly toward my request to demonstrated the workings of their time displacing, universal timepieces. Not only do the instruments show the time of upcoming events spanning several millennia, but also keeps them  in constant remote contact with their tardis - secretly sequestered in the old Voyager's crew quarters.  
     My request for passage on their next adventure was met with the usual "No" followed by, "We don't take passenger requests unless the applicant is a SHE, and that certain SHE must be able to cook, converse freely about multiple topics of a timeless nature, and display a fearlessness above and beyond her gender."

Sunday's Theater Imaginarium  

     The Best Vidlets of the week, assiduously edited for gentler audiences, minors, and those who are Terminally Offended