Starwars.com wants your questions for the astronauts on board Discovery.
Sabershuttle blasts off!
The Discovery launched right on time this morning. The shuttle is carrying the Return of the Jedi lightsaber, and George Lucas himself was in attendance at the launch. For the NASA geeks, the AP has plenty of details.
In a interesting sidebar, this mission also marks the first time that there are two women commanding spacecraft at the same time.
Lightsaber to launch Tuesday
The saber is loaded and ready for the trip to space; Fans can leave messages for the space shuttle astronauts.
Dark Side Wins…Sort of.
If you’re Andy Woerner and his crazy rocketeer friends (translation: Geeks), and you have an idea, four Class M solid-fuel rocket engines, Baltic Birch wood, solid aluminum, CAD software, and friends at Polecat Aerospace (helped by RMS Laser and Aerotech Consumer Aerospace), what would you do?
Build a flyable X-wing fighter, of course.
The Flight of the X-Wing occurred on October 6.
There’s another, more extensive video here. There’s also a link at the bottom to the launch of a Y-Wing on the same day, with in-flight camera footage!
Always the bridesquadron…
Y-Wing rocket fares slightly better than X-Wing. Of course, it’s still in pieces, but I don’t think anyone is expecting otherwise.
Elsewhere, Gizmodo polls on what the X-Wing folks should do next. As I post this, the Millennium Falcon is winning. People are sadists, man.
X-Wing rocket flies, but…
The rocket did launch, but didn’t… exactly… stay up very long. Oh well! (via)
UPDATE: Longer version with background chatter on Gizmodo. (Thanks, Fen!)
Up, up and away: The X-Wing rocket
Andy Woerner and friends have a built a 21-foot by 19 foot X-Wing out of plywood and aluminum, powered by four solid-fuel rocket engines. The wings are radio-controlled and actually move. All the way. Into attack position. How crazy are these folks?
The X-Wing will launch next week (unmanned!) Gizmodo has the full story and all the rocket-geek details.
George Takei honored with asteroid
Not literally; the Committee on Small Body Nomenclature of the International Astronomical Union approved a suggestion from astronomer Tom H. Burbine to rename asteroid 1994 GT9 to 7307 Takei. The man himself comments:
“I am now a heavenly body,” Takei said Tuesday, laughing. “I found out about it yesterday … I was blown away. It came out of the clear, blue sky — just like an asteroid.”
iPhone Wars: A New Hype
Darth Jobs? Say it ain’t so! The Joy of Tech web comic parodies Star Wars and Apple. But now who will they parody when Microsoft takes a whack at the phone market?
The Saturday catchup
All the stuff that got spaced
- Allies in The Clone Wars: TV show is a global production.
- Family Guy: Blue Harvest concept art
- A Sithly go-round for the classic circus poster.
- Know A Legion: Bloodfin Garrison
- Bonnie urges R2 Builders to join the space race.
- Are Artoo and Threepio robo-wimps?
Hyperspace