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A Human Powered Helicopter? We’ll find out Wednesday, May 11th!

5.10.2011 — 2 Comments

The engineering students at the University of Maryland are my latest heroes. How I wish I could be there for their maiden voyage this week as they attempt to win the Sikorsky Prize which has been offered by the American Helicopter Society since 1980 without a winner.

The requirements to win the $250,000 prize:
Hover for 1-minute
Reach a height of 3-meters (10 feet)
Remain in a 10-meter box from lift off

The pilot for the test flight will be University of Maryland grad student, Judy Wexler. With a female pilot, if the team successfully flies their helicopter, they will also receive the world record for the first human-powered helicopter piloted by a female!

The aircraft itself is HUGE – nearly 1/3 the size of a football field and yet engineered to weight about 100-pounds. The video quotes a finish-weight of nearly 140lbs, but they have managed to decrease it to around 100!

I will be following this story to see how their maiden voyage turns out. The first full flight attempt will be TOMORROW, May 11th, and they are planning to live-stream the event here starting at 9AM EDT.

Here is a well-produced video explaining the project and their goal in wining the Sikorsky Prize:

What is mind blowing about this whole thing is that the team of engineers have ONLY been working on this project for 2-years. More information on the project, the team, and the details of the initial flight can be found here.

In General, Linkage, Tech, Videos

The Cube Project – a 10-foot cube house!

5.10.2011 — 7 Comments

Wow. The Cube Project is an initiative of Dr Mike Page at the University of Hertfordshire who set out to build a compact home, no bigger than 3x3x3 meters (about 10x10x10 feet) on the inside, in which one person could live a comfortable, modern existence with a minimum impact on the environment.

I love stuff like this – the idea of building a fully-functional (and noted, quite small) home with the smallest of footprint (both size and eco-wise) is fascinating to me. I think it’s because I loved the idea of building my own tree house that I could one day live in.

Check out the tour video of The Cube Project:

More information about the project from their official website.

In General, Tech, Videos

The disappearing chipmunk

5.9.2011 — 11 Comments

If you can watch this video only once you will have achieved something I didn’t think was possible.

In Videos

Spontaneous Picnic at King’s Gap

5.7.2011 — 2 Comments

Early this evening I texted Jess letting her know that I was wrapping things up in the office and that I had a spontaneous idea for our evening as a family.

The idea: wake the kids up from naps, grab a blanket, some drinks, and a bucket of chicken from KFC and head up to King’s Gap State Park for a family picnic. I’m so thankful to have married a woman who is willing to be as spontaneous as I am!

We arrived up at the park and ran into the mansion-garden where we spread our blanket, took off our shoes, had a time of prayer together and then dug into our supper!

Only a few bites into our chicken and the rain began to fall. (of course)

We quickly scooped up the kids and the chicken and ran for cover. We found another covered area to finish our meal. We love the mansion at the top of the mountain and have visited there a handful of times now. I’m hoping we have numerous spontaneous picnics this Summer!

On the way home we even spotted a fading-fast rainbow and pulled over to snap a picture. We pulled over beside an Amish farm to take the picture and as I was snapping away, the Amish farmer came out to see what the commotion was for. We exchanged quick chit-chat and I pointed out the rainbow. He then asked, “Do you know what that rainbow means?” I, of course, gave him the scientific reasoning of sunlight and droplets of moisture. Just kidding. I loved being able to declare God’s promise together with my Amish brother! He then asked for me to take his picture. (kidding again)

Some pictures from our evening (after the rain stopped):

In Family, General, Images

Tonight’s backyard photoshoot

5.5.2011 — Leave a comment

The weather today was gorgeous. After dinner we cleaned up and headed outside for an hour or so. I took my DSLR along with us and snapped a few ‘keepers’ of the kids.