Dorian Puentes 009193325
Rogelio Ruiz 008672298
Alex Quijije 008846316
Kyle Rahill 008743161
Jose Rivera 008864594
Contribution Made by Each Member:
“Moral Aspect’s”: Dorian Puentes
“Social Aspect’s”: Rogelio Ruiz
“Legal Aspect’s”: Alex Quijije
“Pioneer Aspect’s”: Kyle Rahill
“Environmental Aspect’s”: Jose Rivera
California State University, Long Beach
College of Engineering
ENGR101 SEC09, Fall 2010
November 5, 2010 Blimps are now going to have a great impact on today’s society. Lockheed Martin is developing a HAA (High-Altitude Airship) funded by the Missile Defense Agency. The Pentagon plans to spend $400 million on a very high efficient airship. Lockheed Martin’s HAA is solar powered, helium-filled airship that will fly above the jet stream. HAA will be very beneficial because it will be used for surveillance purposes, weather observation and mobile telecommunications platforms. The HAA sounds like a very efficient airship, but is it efficient when it comes to the environment or society? Is the airship going to have a positive or negative impact? Is Lockheed Martin making everything legal? Lockheed Martin is a global security and information technology company with 136,000 employees worldwide. Their primary customers are the U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. federal government agencies. They design, produce, and maintain advanced technology systems, products, and services. The current company was formed in 1995 with the merger of Lockheed Corporation and Martin Marietta Corporation, both large aerospace and technology companies. The 1996 acquisition of Loral added defense electronics and systems integration to the newly formed Lockheed Martin's capabilities. Lockheed Martin's Aeronautics division has extensive experience in Lighter Than Air (LTA) vehicle development. Lockheed Martin's LTA Persistent Surveillance Systems resides in Akron, Ohio. It contains equipment and facilities specially suited for the development and testing of LTA aircraft. Since the Akron branch's first contract in 1928 it has developed and produced more than 8,000 airships. Lockheed Martin pushes the envelope in advanced technology development. It had sales of $45.2 billion in 2009. Lockheed Martin's High Altitude Airship concept is a solar-powered, unmanned, autonomous blimp with diverse, customer-enhanced capabilities. It will operate for months per mission providing services all day, every day. It will provide the warfighter with Intelligent Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) and beyond line of sight communications. Their proof-of-concept prototype is called the HALE-D, for High Altitude Long Endurance - Demonstrator. The prototype's capabilities and dimensions are less than the planned production model. It can operate a 50 lb 500 watt payload at 60,000 for a minimum of 15 days. Lockheed Martin's HAA promises to be a more cost effective and environmentally friendly intelligence and communications system than current UAV systems such as the Global Hawk and Predator.
The High Altitude Airship, unit of Lockheed Martin, is an air-vehicle that is unmanned and can be used in multiple ways that is morally beneficial. Since the airship is unmanned, it can be controlled by a ground station and does not need to risk a person’s life. The HAA can be used as a telecommunications relay that can help people with physical disabilities. The HAA is also solar-paneled and helium filled so it can benefit the environment. Being solar-paneled, the engine relies on the sun as a source of energy to propel the airship. The material used to create the airship is a nylon and aluminum frame, which is cheap. The low cost to create the airship is beneficial for the makers and can be easier to be massed produced. The Lockheed Martin Corporation states that the HAA can also reach “stratospheric altitudes (65,000 feet)” and be used as a weather monitor, which can benefit the public because it can be a tool used to predict the weather. Thus, the HAA can be used as an environmental monitor to observe the events occurring on the environment. Most importantly, the HAA can be used as a military utility to detect missiles. The HAA is morally more beneficial than the defects of the airship. The HAA can be used for homeland security, but the public may view this usage of the HAA as a violation of a person’s privacy. The public may also complain if the HAA crashes or deflates on a public area because it can cause harm. The Lockheed Martin Corporation states that the HAA has “a 50 pound payload suite.” The weight of the airship crashing down can harm people if it lands in a public facility. The HAA can also crash and have a helium leak, that can suffocate a person. Overall, the main fear and moral defect of the HAA is if the airship will crash or deflate on a public area. In Addition, the HAA will help the military by communicating much faster from base to base, or country to country during combat. This airship could be used as a communicator, as a surveillance platform, and also observe weather and this will help the military even more by being informed of situations much quicker. The HAA has a radar that could detect approaches of other aircrafts that get close to the United States and it will notify the military of the aircrafts, whether they are friendly or not. The military will like to get this airship because it could be used as a defense effort whenever there is an attack or an attempt of an attack to the U.S. The HAA would reach altitudes of about 70,000 feet, allowing it to go out of the earth’s atmosphere and makes it unique from other ordinary airships (blimps) that are visible. The HAA is an unmanned airship, meaning that it is controlled through controls from the earth, and it is filled with helium that allows it to take-off. The military’s best benefit would be that it will be used as a peacekeeper with other countries because the airship will carry no weapons, it will just communicate with the United States about what’s going on in other countries. The HAA is able to stay up in the air for several weeks, even months, because it is able to get its own power and it keeps the helium loss to a minimum. The HAA is made out of very thin-film photovoltaic solar cells, and light-weight and high-strength fabrics that allow it to stay up afloat for such a long time. Obviously, the HAA has to be powered by something but is it environment friendly? The HAA is solar powered which means it is powered by electric motors. Electric motors are environment friendly because it will cause less pollution without using any type of fuel. Lockheed Martin is planning to have the airship up in the skies for weeks and if possible for months. In order to maintain the airship with energy they had to make the airship powered by the sun which will help the airship and the environment. Using photovoltaic technology to power an airship is difficult because it can be powered in the daytime especially in summer, but at night the airship will not generate power. The airship will need very advanced energy storage systems to have enough power to maintain the airship running through the skies. Also the propulsion units need to be lightweight to reduce weight also has to be low powered but strong enough to keep the airship above the jet stream. HAA is blimp after all so it has to have helium in order to fly. Helium is a very abundant element which can be used over and over for airships. Helium is also nontoxic and it not harmful to the environment. Airship can have a leakage of helium without worrying of harming the environment or the atmosphere. Helium can affect people by inhaling it which causes high voice, dizziness, headache and suffocation. The odd of have a leakage from the airship are very low especially around people. The HAA is very environment friendly with many benefits. With the solar power energy, Lockheed Martin does not have worry about fuel for the airship. Furthermore, there was first a resistance from both the house and the senate and the budget was cut down by 40.1 million dollars. The house cut the program by 20 millions and the senate cut the program by 25 million dollars. Then in 2008 due to the budget crisis, instead of The Missile Defense Agency the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command (USASMDC). The new agency that contracted the HAA airship specializes in space, high altitude, and ground-based midcourse defense. There are other high altitude airships that are in competition with the Lockheed martin. The first other one is the ISIS which is being built by DARPA. This high altitude ship has power up to 400 watts and it can reach up to 70,000 ft. Another airship is the HiSentenial which is being built and funded by the SMDC Technical Center. The difference of this one is that it has a payload of 50 lbs with 50 watts of power and it can reach an altitude of 67,000 ft. The last of the other airships being built is the HALE which is being built and funded by Lindstrand (ESA). This airship has a 600kg payload and power of 80 watts and can reach an altitude of up 70,000 ft. All these airship that are being contracted are in a race to see which one is the most affective. Once the best one is found it can be used to hide above the cloud line and it will be able to help spy on enemy forces. These airships are all unmanned and are powered by electric motors. Finally the HAA airship by Lockheed’s Martin will be a great creation with many benefits to the military and society. The airship is environment friendly, have a good use for the people. For example it can be used for protection and for weather predictions. It s build legally because the Pentagon is willing to spend $400 million on a HAA. Morally it’s for a good cause but it can still be used to invade people’s privacy. Over all the airship is a great advancement in engineering which will have great impacts on tomorrow’s society.
Annotations Our sources are creditable because they come from articles used from the Long Beach Database. Also the website we used to obtain information came straight from Lockheed’s Martin website. Even though the information came from the Lockheed’s Martin it still cannot be creditable because a company will not writing the negative factors of its own product. http://www.lockheedmartin.com/products/HighAltitudeAirship/index.html
References
Lockheed Martin, L. (2008, April 1). High altitude airship (haa). Retrieved from http://www.lockheedmartin.com/products/HighAltitudeAirship/index.html
Pike, J. (2008, June 14). High altitude airship (haa). Retrieved from http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/systems/haa.htm Warwick, G. (2009). High Hopes. Aviation Week & Space Technology, 170(14), 46. Retrieved from Academic Search Complete database.: http://mcc1.library.csulb.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=38706747&site=ehost-live
