SpaceX Will Try to Land Rocket on Floating Ocean Platform

As reported by Discovery News: SpaceX will apparently attempt something truly epic during next week's cargo launch to the International Space Station.

During the Dec. 16 launch from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, which will send SpaceX's robotic Dragon capsule toward the orbiting lab, the California-based company will try to bring the first stage of its Falcon 9 rocket back to Earth for a controlled landing on a floating platform in the Atlantic Ocean.

The bold maneuver marks a big step forward in SpaceX's development of reusable-rocket technology, which the company's billionaire founder, Elon Musk, says could eventually cut the cost of spaceflight by a factor of 100 and perhaps make Mars colonization economically feasible.

Musk shared photos of the Falcon 9 and landing platform via Twitter late last month, ratcheting up interest in the cargo mission, the fifth of 12 unmanned resupply flights SpaceX will make to the space station for NASA under a $1.6 billion contract.

"Autonomous spaceport drone ship. Thrusters repurposed from deep sea oil rigs hold position within 3m even in a storm," Musk tweeted about the platform on Nov. 22. "Base is 300 ft by 100 ft, with wings that extend width to 170 ft. Will allow refuel & rocket flyback in future," he added in another tweet.

The Falcon 9 photo revealed that the rocket is outfitted with "hypersonic grid fins" to increase stability during a return to Earth.

"Grid fins are stowed on ascent and then deploy on reentry for 'x-wing' style control," Musk tweeted on Nov. 22. "Each fin moves independently for pitch/yaw/roll."

At a conference at MIT in October, Musk said that SpaceX would attempt to land the Falcon 9 first stage on the floating platform during the rocket's next flight. The next liftoff on the rocket's schedule is the Dec. 16 Dragon launch.

Musk estimated a 50 percent chance of success for the platform landing on the first attempt, but said the odds would improve on subsequent missions.

"There are a lot of launches that will occur over the next year," Musk said at the conference, which was called "AeroAstro at 100" and celebrated 100 years of MIT aerospace research. "I think it's quite likely that one of those flights, we'll be able to land and refly, so I think we're quite close."

SpaceX has attempted soft ocean splashdowns of the Falcon 9 first stage on three recent launches — in September 2013, and in April and July of this year. During the September 2013 attempt, technicians were able to relight the first-stage engine twice, but the booster ended up hitting the water hard. On the two subsequent attempts, the rocket stage made a successful, controlled descent to the water's surface, SpaceX representatives said — but there was no platform to land on.

'MeshMe' Communication App Works without a Cellular Network

As reported by MIT Technology Review: A new smartphone app lets you send text messages to your friends without a Wi-Fi or cellular network. It could make it a lot simpler to stay in touch wherever there are plenty of other people but the normal networks are either overloaded or nonexistent.

Called MeshMe, the app allows you to chat with several people at a time while your phone is in airplane mode as long as you keep Wi-Fi or Bluetooth radio on. An iPhone MeshMe app was released last month, and an Android version is expected to be ready in several months, MeshMe CEO Jory Schwach says.

MeshMe uses what’s known as mesh networking: it treats each smartphone running the app as a router, passing data from one handset to the next to get messages to recipients via the most efficient pathway. Even if you’re acting as a node in this network, you can’t read data sent over MeshMe unless it is routed to you, Schwach says.

Mesh networking is increasingly used to help people keep in touch even when out of network range (see “Build Your Own Internet with Mobile Mesh Networking”). An app called FireChat has a “nearby” chat room that allows you to send messages to anyone within 30 meters of you (see “The Latest Chat App for iPhone Needs No Internet Connection”).

MeshMe lets you talk with anyone, as long as a message can reach them via other MeshMe users. It can find contacts by combing your phone’s address book or your Facebook profile.

When you send another MeshMe user a message, your phone asks devices nearby if they know the person you’re looking for; if those devices do not, the message is passed on to other users. Once your phone finds a good path, it can route the data; and if the network changes (say, someone turns off her phone), MeshMe will try to find a new route.

Schwach says the distance over which MeshMe will work varies according to the amount of wireless signal interference in the area (which increases if there are more phone-toting people around). The iPhone 6 should be able to transfer data via MeshMe at a distance of about 20 to 30 meters using Wi-Fi. Over Bluetooth, it’s more like 10 to 15 meters.

In one test, the startup positioned a person with MeshMe running on an iPhone on each floor of a 13-floor building, and it took less than half a second to send a message from the user on the ground floor to the user on the top floor.

In my limited experience, MeshMe didn’t always work. I tried it with my iPhone and one belonging to a coworker, and for some reason I could only get the app to send messages one way while the handsets were in airplane mode and their Wi-Fi radios were turned on. After setting it up with a second coworker’s iPhone, however, it worked fine, and messages sometimes arrived faster than they did when routed over a regular wireless network.

34-hour Trucking HOS Restart Suspension Said Still Likely Part of Congressional Spending Bill

As reported by The Trucker: Congress went back to work Tuesday on a $1.1 trillion, government-wide spending bill that likely will include language to suspend the current 34-hour restart provision of the Hours of Service rule.

But, The Associated Press reported that snags caused by policy difference were holding up progress.

Congress must either pass a new spending bill or extend the current one by midnight Thursday, when the current bill expires.

The massive measure is the main piece of unfinished business before the lame-duck Congress packs up for the holidays and Republicans take full control of Capitol Hill next month. GOP leaders want a clean slate to start next year and are eager for a deal. Democrats want a deal as well — while they retain power in the Senate.

Money issues have been worked out, but hang-ups Monday included a demand by House Republicans to ease regulations on businesses that use derivatives to hedge risk. Talks continued on a provision that would mean pension cuts for more than 1 million retirees who are paid by distressed multiemployers pension plans.

On Saturday and Monday, trucking industry stakeholders, including the Department of Transportation, industry associations and safety advocates took turns issuing statements about the 34-restart suspension.

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx told lawmakers in a letter 
last Thursday that he was seriously concerned that any suspension
of the 34-hour restart would put lives at risk as it would increase the 
maximum allowable work limits for truck drivers from an average of
70 hours per week to over 82.

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx used his Fast Lane blog to urge Congress not to suspend the rule.

So did safety advocates, who held a news conference at the U.S. Capitol saying that legislation to suspend the rule would be a Christmas present for the trucking industry.

The American Trucking Associations and the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association both issued statements recently urging passage of the suspension legislation.

The broader spending measure would fund the day-to-day operations of every federal agency, from the Pentagon to the Border Patrol to the agencies coordinating the government's response to Ebola at home and abroad. Details were closely held but the parameters of the measure came into shape after lengthy negotiations last week and over the weekend.

Top leaders had hoped to unveil the spending measure by Monday evening in anticipation of a House vote Wednesday, but working out the measure's many policy add-ons — called "riders" — proved too difficult for the top Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate. Now, the hope is that the measure will be made public Tuesday.

Current funding expires at midnight Thursday, so a short-term funding bill is likely to be required to make sure there isn't a government shutdown.

Also on the packed agenda for the week is a renewal of the government's terrorism insurance programs, eagerly sought by the construction industry; a one-year renewal of a package of expired tax breaks for individuals and businesses; and a defense policy measure that renews the Pentagon's authority to train Syrian rebels to battle Islamic State militants who control large swaths of Iraq and Syria.

President Barack Obama would receive more than $5 billion of his $6.2 billion request to combat Ebola at home and abroad, but aides said the measure is likely to undercut reforms to the school lunch program that are a top priority of first lady Michelle Obama by easing requirements for limiting salt and including more whole grains in lunches that are the main meal of the day for many poor children.

There's more than $70 billion to conduct overseas anti-terror operations, including funds to fight Islamic State extremists and money for State Department diplomacy efforts. But the Pentagon's core budget would be held flat at current levels of about $490 billion.

The bill freezes funding for core government accounts at slightly more than $1 trillion, but the total cost will approach $1.1 trillion after war funding and emergency money to fight Ebola is added in. Veterans' health programs get increases, but large portions of the budget are mostly frozen in place.

Plans for Future 'Spaceport Colorado' Gaining Pace

As reported by the Denver Post: Efforts to establish Spaceport Colorado — the proposed facility for the commercial space industry at Front Range Airport — are back on track after a difficult year in which the general aviation airport in Watkins went without a manager and Adams County took over its operations.

Dave Ruppel, who took the post as the 3,600-acre airport's manager less than a month ago, said Monday that Front Range's spaceport application to the Federal Aviation Administration should be completed in the next few months and submitted to the agency by spring or early summer.

The FAA then will have six months to review the application and say "yes" or "no" to a facility designed to attract high-tech research, commercial space development, and eventually the creation of a horizontal launch pad for space transport.

"If we're not a part of it, we could stand to lose our place of leadership in the space industry in Colorado," Ruppel said.

Ruppel, a retired Navy aviator who most recently headed the Yampa Valley Regional Airport in Steamboat Springs, said Front Range's location 6 miles east of DIA and near major rail lines puts it in a perfect position to push forward the country's emerging commercial space sector. There are nine licensed spaceports in the United States.  

"It's a fantastic hub for aeronautics and aviation-related businesses," he said.

Adams County spokesman Jim Siedlecki said most of the "heavy lifting" — the feasibility and environmental studies for Spaceport Colorado — has been completed and that now it's just a matter of getting federal government approval for the facility. Two years ago, Spaceport Colorado secured more than $600,000 in financial support from various entities, including the Colorado Department of Transportation, Aurora and DIA. It also landed a $200,000 grant from the FAA.  

Last year, Spaceport Colorado signed a memorandum of understanding with Swiss Space Systems to have the Switzerland-based company, known as S3, locate its North American headquarters in Adams County. S3 is developing a flight system similar to what Virgin Galactic is developing with SpaceShip-Two. Instead of offering space tourism, however, the company will use its suborbital space plane to deploy small satellites. 

Ruppel said while the death of a test pilot in the Oct. 31 crash of a Virgin Galactic rocket at the Mojave Air & Space Port was tragic, it doesn't represent a setback in Front Range's efforts. He said the FAA has a rigorous licensing process for any space plane that wants to take to the air.

Adams County Commissioner Erik Hansen said space travel will face many of the same challenges air travel did in its formative years.

But keeping the spaceport concept vital in Colorado, Hansen said, is critical. And the steps the county has taken in the last 12 months to help put Front Range Airport's finances in order and hire new leadership were necessary to moving forward from here.

"What it did is create significant stability at the airport so we can really take off," he said. 

How the Anti-Uber Backlash is Spreading Around the World

As reported by the Washington Post: There's no doubt that Uber, a car-sharing service launched in San Francisco in 2009, is a booming business. With billions in estimated revenues it's now set up in more than 200 cities in 51 countries.

It's equally sure, however, that the company has had its share of domestic controversies, from accusations of sabotage against competitors to suggestions that they would threaten journalists. Internationally, when dealing with different laws and cultures, the potential for new controversies is likely even higher.

It's worth pointing out, of course, that Uber has often been made welcome in countries, and sometimes is viewed as a positive force (in Saudi Arabia some see it as helping women, barred from driving, become more independent). The company has also shown a remarkable willingness to engage in lengthy legal and publicity battles to win over courts and the public.

But can any one company win so many battles? Below, we've listed some of the controversies the American company has found itself in around the world.

Australia
Uber says it operates out of a number of cities in Australia, including Sydney and Melbourne, though a number of states impose fines on "unauthorized" drivers and those without insurance. In particular, it has faced an organized backlash from taxi firms in Queensland, who have publicly warned of safety issues with Uber drivers.

"The government has told these companies not to operate but they are ignoring this," Taxi Council of Queensland Benjamin Wash said recently. "Queensland taxi drivers undergo daily criminal checks, but ride-share drivers don't. You simply don't know who is behind the wheel."

Belgium

The capital Brussels, already known for its complicated taxi laws, banned Uber in April, and threatened drivers with a $12,000 (€10,000) fine.

However, Uber has disputed the ruling and continued to operate. "Brussels is one of our fastest-growing European cities," Filip Nuytemans, Uber's operations manager in the Brussels, told Bloomberg in October. Local authorities are now said to be working on legislation that may allow Uber to operate.

Britain
In London, Uber has faced down one of the world's most entrenched (and expensive) taxi systems. It's led to protests from the iconic "black cab" drivers, who brought traffic to a standstill this summer and demanded Uber be further regulated. There have also been reports that black cab companies have been paying detectives to pose as Uber customers to gather evidence for an upcoming court case.

Canada
Uber has recently been expanding its UberX service (which connects riders with drivers in regular cars) in certain Canadian cities, which has prompted a backlash. Montreal's mayor has told reporters that UberX is illegal, and the city of Toronto has tried to shut the entire Uber's services down,

France
On Dec. 12, Uber is expected to find out if its Uberpop service (similar to UberX but riders share cars) will be banned in France. The company also suffered a backlash after the Lyon office ran a promotion that paired riders with "hot chick" drivers.

Germany
Taxi drivers in Germany have been particular vocal in their opposition to Uber, with one legal challenge from Taxi Deutschland calling the ride-sharing app a "form of locust share-economy" that was taking part in "anarchy capitalism."

The company has since faced legal problems, most notably a nationwide cease and desist order given out by a Frankfurt court in August that threatened a fine of up to $300,000 per ride for drivers. That decision was later overturned.

The Netherlands
On Monday, the Trade and Industry Appeals Tribunal in The Hague ordered Uber to stop its UberPop service claiming it broke rules that drivers must be licensed. "This is only the first step in a long-running legal battle," Uber said in a statement in response to the ruling.

India
Almost certainly the most worrying problem listed here, Uber was banned in New Delhi this week after a driver was accused of raping a passenger and arrested. Police also called in Uber executives and accused the service of failing to properly check the driver's background, though the service will continue in five other Indian cities.

Here, Uber has found itself at the center of a larger problem: India has had a number of high-profile sexual assaults in recent years, sometimes involving attacks on public transport. As Rama Lakshmi writes for WorldViews, before the alleged attack the service had been viewed as a good thing for women, allowing them independence and safety late at night.

The incident in New Delhi was only the latest problem for the group in India: The country's stricter requirements for credit card transactions also put it in conflict with the ride-sharing app.

Japan 
In Tokyo, Uber faces a less worrying problem: What Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has described as “very byzantine and complicated regulations." These regulations forced Uber to register as a "travel agency" and work with existing companies. The company also faces competition from a number of other ride-sharing apps.

Philippines
Uber has faced repeated criticism from authorities in the Philippines, including sting-operations designed to catch drivers operating without commercial licenses. The government has recently been working with Uber executives to create new legislation, however.

Russia
While regulations in Russia are comparatively simple when compared to other countries, Moscow already has a culture of unlicensed taxis that makes Uber's expansion there difficult. Muscovites can often just hail one by standing on the street corner, or via a number of apps that have existed for years before Uber arrived.

South Korea
The Seoul city government has repeatedly said that Uber's services violate its laws, and recently threatened to fine or even jail drivers using non-properly licensed vehicles. "Those without a taxi license cannot offer rides in return for money," Seoul Metropolitan Government's Choi Eul-ko said last week according to the Korea Times. "If they do, they will be in big trouble.”

Spain
In October, the city of Madrid announced plans to fine unlicensed Uber drivers and the government of Catalan recently announced its hopes to impound Uber cars. On Tuesday, a court in Madrid announced a preliminary nationwide ban on Uber.

Taiwan
Taipai's taxi drivers staged protests about Uber over the summer, and the Taiwanese government plans to pull the app from local stores as it does not meet the country's legislation, the China Post reported recently.

Thailand

In November, Uber was declared illegal by the Thai government. In particular, the government objected to the credit card only technology used by Uber.

USA
The City of Portland Oregon announced a law suit against Uber, and has asked the Court to stop the 'illegal' service.  Uber service has been suspended in Nevada by a State judge.  In New York, taxis and limousine operators will likely get an Uber-like application from Kallos to help them compete against online ride providers like Uber and Lyft.

Heathrow Plane in Near-miss With Drone

As reported by BBC News: An Airbus A320 pilot reported seeing a helicopter-style drone as the jet was 700 feet off the ground on its approach to the runway at 1416 GMT on 22 July.

The CAA has not identified the airline or how close the drone came to the plane, which can carry 180 people.

It gave the incident an "A" rating, meaning a "serious risk of collision".

This is the highest incident rating the CAA can give.

Investigators were unable to identify the drone, which did not appear on air traffic control radar and disappeared after the encounter.

Crash warning

The CAA said it had to depend on people using their common sense when they operated drones

In May the pilot of an ATR 72 turbo-prop plane reported seeing a helicopter drone only 80 feet away as he approached Southend airport at a height of 1,500 feet.

The incidents have prompted a warning from the British Airline Pilots' Association (Balpa) that the rapid increase in the number of drones operated by amateur enthusiasts now poses "a real risk" to commercial aircraft.

The association's general secretary, Jim McAuslan said drones could cause a repeat of the "Hudson River experience", when a plane was forced to land in water in New York in 2009 after birds were sucked into its engines.

"The risk of a 10 kilogram object hitting a plane is a real one that pilots are very concerned about" he said.

"A small drone could be a risky distraction for a pilot coming into land and cause serious damage if they hit one."

Sales of drones have increased rapidly, with UK sales running at a rate of between 1,000 and 2,000 every month.

They are expected to be very popular as Christmas presents.

They cost as little as £35 for a smaller model - more advanced drones capable of carrying a high definition camera and travelling at 45 miles per hour cost almost £3,000.

Only a very small minority of people operating drones have attended training courses in how to fly them.

'Common sense'

A spokesman for the CAA said it had to depend on people using their common sense when they operated drones.

He said the current level of risk should be "kept in perspective" but warned that breaking laws governing the use of drones could potentially threaten commercial aircraft.

"People using unmanned aircraft need to think, use common sense and take responsibility for them", he said.

"There are rules which have the force of law and have to be followed."

Drones may not be flown higher than 400 feet or further than 500 meters from the operator, and they must not go within 50 meters of people, vehicles or buildings.

There are exclusion zones around airports and the approaches to them for drones weighing more than seven kilograms.

Mr McAuslan said there was an urgent need for rules to be tightened before much larger unmanned cargo planes - potentially the size of a Boeing 737 - took to the skies.

Blazing The Waze: FDOT Is The Traffic App’s First U.S. Partner

As reported by WLRN: Earlier this year the Florida Department of Transportation entered into a partnership with the traffic data company Waze. The Israeli startup, now owned by Google, lets “Wazers” use a smartphone app to report the location of crashes, congestion, potholes, road kill and police officers among many other things.

The agreement is purely a “data-sharing” partnership. Waze gets access to the stream of information produced by the road sensors FDOT uses to monitor traffic flow on Florida’s major highways. And FDOT gets access to the myriad reports filed by Wazers.

“Even the wealthiest states or cities, they can afford sensors in the roads, but they’re really reserved for the main roads,” says Di-Ann Eisnor, head of growth for Waze.

Instead of in-road sensors, Waze uses a smartphone’s GPS to produce an army of roaming surveyors, perpetually measuring traffic flow and reporting back. By getting a data-dump from Waze every couple of minutes, FDOT will now be able to check in on roads it couldn’t afford to cover with sensors, like US-1, SR 441 and Tamiami Trail, says Russell Allen, who works on FDOT’s Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) team. (For its part, Waze says FDOT’s data immediately increased its quality in Florida by 10 percent.)

Below: A data visualization of all accidents reported on I-95 during the month of November. The scale goes from green (the low end) to red (the high end). Created by Waze.

Waze is now in data-sharing agreements with about 20 public entities, ranging from the city government of Rio De Janeiro to the New York Police Department.

The Florida Department of Transportation was the second partner globally and the first in the United States. Among other things, Rio De Janeiro is using the Waze data to plan routes for its garbage trucks, according to Eisnor and the NYPD is giving Waze the locations of some of its traffic officers as a way to deter speeders before they see the police cars. (The NYPD did not respond to an interview request on the tactic.)

Waze gives credit to Florida’s outgoing Secretary of Transportation, Ananth Prasad, for forging the partnership. In an FDOT press release from May announcing the agreement, Prasad made clear some of his hopes for the program:

“As we saw during the recent heavy flooding in Florida’s panhandle, up-to-date traffic information is vital to letting the public know what roads and bridges are open and closed during a weather emergency. This data sharing is another example of a public-private partnership bringing together infrastructure experts and technical experts that will greatly benefit motorists.”

Di-Ann Eisnor said Waze tested a similar use-case when Hurricane Sandy hit New York City. “We got a call from the White House, who said, 'We have no idea which gas stations are open... We don’t know how long the lines are. ... Is there any way that your users can help us figure out which gas stations are open?”

Waze sent a message to users in the area asking for help. Eisnor said they got about 10,000 responses. “And that’s what FEMA was able to use to figure where to route their fuel trucks.”

When asked about measures taken to protect the privacy of users, Eisnor said: “We don’t even go anywhere near a line that could violate anyone’s privacy.” She specified that Waze doesn’t collect identifiable information, including starting and ending points of Wazer trips.

Russell Allen said FDOT is concerned with real-time, in-the-moment traffic information. “We don’t really do much with patterns, collecting data,” he said.

Below a visualization of a day's worth of traffic in Miami put together by Waze and Google Data Arts team.