Author: Administrator

Or at least a picture that we took is.  We’ve been fortunate to have done five high altitude flights for flower artists Makoto Azuma. Always an amazing experience.

Today the team conducted pressure test on the flight model air beam. We’ll be running this one up to 100,000 feet in the spring.

We mounted a Google Vision Object Recognition kit on a small drone. This a baby step toward UAV’s being able to see & avoid other aircraft. The goal of this test series is to count other drones it sees.

Success! For the last week JPA, the FAA and the Ascender have been out in the desert. We were issued the Certificate of Airworthiness for the airship. It’s the accumulation of 2 years of work.

The Ascender is the 1st UAV airship in the world to be so licensed.

I haven’t posted any current pics of Belle (Bellavia, our submarine) in a while. It’s just really hard to get good pics with all the clutter of the shop in the background. Here’s Belle as of yesterday, clutter and all.

The TransAtmospheric Ascender approaching the Dark Sky Station while the Orbital Ascender departs for the International Space Station. Make big plans, then do them.

We got the new hatch hinges mounted on Belle. The hatch has changed from a two person wrestling match to an easy one hand lift. Still a bit of trimming and adjusting to go.