What Will Space Travel Be Like?
NASA's futuristic
Starship 2040 - a traveling space transportation exhibit that gives
visitors a look at human space flight as it might exist 40 years
from now - will help celebrate science at Pensacola's annual
Festival on the Green on April 2-3 at the University of West
Florida campus.
More than 12,000 guests are expected to attend the annual family
festival that celebrates community, art, education, family and
entertainment. A 2004 festival addition, "Celebration of Science,"
sponsored by the University of West Florida National Alumni
Association, will feature Starship 2040 and other interactive NASA
exhibits.
Starship 2040 will be open to the public on the University of
West Florida Library Green between noon and 5 p.m. (EST) April 2,
and from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (EST) April 3. The exhibit is handicapped
accessible and admission is free.
Starship 2040 is a hands-on mockup of a futuristic space
cruiseliner that allows visitors to move through full-sized
control, passenger and engineering compartments. Audio effects -
engine noises, computer and crew conversations - add to the
ambience of the experience.
The traveling exhibit will offer festival-goers and children
from area schools a glimpse into a very possible future - one in
which humans will travel and work in space safely, affordably and
as routinely as we now navigate the skies.
Boarding Starship 2040, visitors will learn about the Vision for
Space Exploration, announced in January, designed to extend a human
presence beyond low Earth orbit in the quest to understand the
origins of the universe and to know whether life is unique here on
Earth.
"This exhibit ties to the Vision for Space Exploration," said
John Dumoulin, exhibits manager at NASA's Marshall Space Flight
Center in Huntsville, Ala. "We want to share this exciting plan
with America, and Starship 2040 is one way to do that."
Starship 2040's Florida tour began March 23 in Tallahassee, and
visited Panama City's Gulf Coast Salute Air Show at Tyndall Air
Force Base March 27-28. It will next visit Jacksonville April 5-7,
Miami April 9-14 and Lakeland April 16-19. In 2002, Starship 2040
came to Florida's Daytona Speedway and Tallahassee, where
enthusiastic crowds of school children and the public toured the
exhibit. In 2003, the exhibit completed tours of New York, Texas,
Maine, Alaska, Montana and Utah, where almost 100,000 visitors
immersed themselves in the sights and sounds of a commercial
passenger space vehicle.
NASA places particular emphasis on inspiring young people -
tomorrow's space explorers - seeking to motivate children not only
to dream of a future in space, but to pursue careers in math,
science and engineering - the building blocks of America's space
program.
While touring Starship 2040 and talking with NASA experts
staffing the exhibit, visitors will learn about technologies now
being investigated by NASA and its partner organizations to
increase the safety and reliability of space transportation systems
while dramatically lowering costs - making space travel safe and
affordable enough for routine flights just a few decades from
now.
All the innovations suggested aboard the exhibit - automated
vehicle health monitoring systems, high-energy propulsion drive,
navigational aids and emergency and safety systems - are based on
concepts and technologies now being studied at NASA centers and
academic and industry partner institutions around the nation.