{"id":25155,"date":"2021-10-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-21T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/?post_type=purple_issue&p=25155"},"modified":"2021-10-21T12:29:54","modified_gmt":"2021-10-21T12:29:54","slug":"field-of-view-space-inventions-that-didnt-quite-take-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/2021\/10\/21\/field-of-view-space-inventions-that-didnt-quite-take-off\/","title":{"rendered":"Field of view: Space inventions that didn\u2019t quite take off"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

An airship on Venus? Jonathan Powell<\/strong> looks at space travel\u2019s stranger concepts<\/p>\n\n

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Riding the Lunar Cycle: Rowland Emett demonstrates his whimsical invention in 1970 <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n

The saying that \u2018necessity is the mother of invention\u2019 is known to us all, and there have been many great ideas spawned in eureka moments. However, aside from Back <\/em>to <\/em>the <\/em>Future\u2019s <\/em>ingenious flux capacitor, there have and will continue to be some clever concepts that never saw their true potential, and the filing cabinet on space orientated ideas is bulging at the seams.<\/p>\n\n

Let\u2019s take the \u2018space elevator\u2019 (pun intended). This idea was first explored by Arthur C Clarke in his 1979 novel The <\/em>Fountains <\/em>of <\/em>Paradise, <\/em>where he envisaged a mammoth tower reaching into space. The plan was to reach beyond the gravitational pull of Earth, thus via the space elevator enabling material and supplies to be delivered some 36,000km up in geosynchronous orbit.<\/p>\n\n

The space elevator, along with the parallel idea of the \u2018spaceline\u2019 \u2013 which proposed a tethered cable from the surface of the Moon back to Earth\u2019s atmosphere \u2013 certainly carries merit. However, the International Space Station, along with humankind\u2019s passion to blast stuff from the ground upwards, have over time negated a need to develop such inventions.<\/p>\n\n

Then there\u2019s the \u2018space gun\u2019, or \u2018Verne gun\u2019 (after novelist Jules Verne\u2019s fictional firing structure), powering craft into space almost cannon-style, but with no circus-style safety net. This concept gained serious attention for a time, particularly under America\u2019s Project HARP (High Altitude Research Project) and its Martlet series of tests in the early 1960s, but the idea never really took off.<\/p>\n\n

The \u2018StarTram\u2019 idea is not yet a dead duck but remains questionable. The system, probably situated on a high mountain summit, would use magnetic levitation (or maglev) where two sets of magnets repel and push equally to force the object forward.<\/span> One can imagine it as rather like quickly squeezing a tomato down a hosepipe but without the tomato touching the sides.<\/p>\n\n

With the US Space Shuttle having commanded the skies, one feels somewhat sad for the Soviet version that was created as potential competition. BURAN, meaning \u2018blizzard\u2019, was built and tested but that\u2019s as far as the project went.<\/p>\n\n

The questionable High- Altitude Venus Operational Concept (HAVOC) is an idea intended to send piloted, helium-filled airships cruising through the Venusian atmosphere. One can predict that astronaut crew applicants will be thin on the ground on recruitment day.<\/p>\n\n

However, in order to properly appreciate the whole notion of the invention properly, one must look at the inventor: not the large corporations but the lone individual \u2013 an individual with a wonderfully creative mind, someone who really is out there!<\/p>\n\n

Look no further than British inventor Rowland Emett OBE (1906\u201390) and his incredible Lunar Cycle, which upon inspection deserves the highest of praise. With its moving dustpan and brush to sweep up Moon dust, a cheese comparator unit to check the composition of comestibles supposedly located on the dark side of the Moon, and a cat to chase off the lunar mice, Emmet\u2019s invention would certainly have enhanced NASA\u2019s Apollo technology after the \u201cOne small step for man\u2026.\u201d event in 1969. It is Rowland Emmett and his kindred spirit that encapsulate the true sense of the word \u2018inventing\u2019\u2026 and long may it continue.<\/p>\n\n

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Jonathan Powell <\/strong>is a freelance writer and broadcaster. A former correspondent at BBC Radio Wales, he has written three books on astronomy and is currently astronomy columnist at the South Wales Argus<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

Photo: ROLLS PRESS\/POPPERFOTO\/GETTY IMAGES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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