This
story was updated Friday at 9:50 p.m. EST.
A
Seattle-based team has won $900,000 in this year's Space Elevator Games, a NASA-sponsored
contest to build machines powered by laser beams that can climb a cable in the
sky.
The
homemade cable-climber built by the team LaserMotive of Washington state climbed
a 3,000-foot (900-meter) tether suspended by a helicopter at a speed of about 8
mph (13 kph) during a Wednesday attempt. The entry ultimately managed to climb the cable four times in two days, with
a best time of about 3 minutes and 48 seconds.
The feat
was the best
performance yet of a miniature space elevator prototype and qualified
LaserMotive to win the second-level prize of NASA's $2 million Power Beaming
Challenge this week at the Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force
Base in the California desert. The contest requires competitors to beam power
from a remote source to propel their vehicles up a 1/4-inch thick steel cable
dangling from a helicopter.
The 2009 Space
Elevator Games are the first in which prize money has been awarded and has
"been a very successful competition," said NASA's Centennial
Challenges director Andy Petro. "Power beaming is truly a 21st century
technology."
Despite
LaserMotive's success, it is still a long way away from what would be needed
to carry humans to Earth orbit, as proponents envision.
Space
elevators were first popularized in the 1970s by the science fiction novels
of Arthur C. Clarke, as a means to reach space without using a rocket. Instead,
a ship could climb along a fixed structure, like a beam or cable, suspended in
space by a permanent geostationary satellite 22,000 miles (35,000 km) above
Earth. The sticking points are the need for a super-strong, yet light, material
for the tether, and a good way to anchor the other end securely. Not to mention
the vehicle to climb it.
That's
where the Space Elevator Games come in. Any team that can power their entrant for an average
speed of 11 mph (18 kph) can qualify for a portion of the total $2 million
prize purse on offer. The competition is sponsored by the Spaceward Foundation
and NASA's Centennial
Challenges program aimed to spur development in space exploration.
An attempt
by the Kansas City Space Pirates on Wednesday fell short of the speed requirement
and got stuck partway up the cable during a Friday climb attempt. A climber built
by the University of Saskatchewan Space Design Team was unable to compete
during the three-day contest because of a series of technical glitches, NASA
officials said.
Had LaserMotive's entry managed
to climb the entire length of the cable in under 3 minutes, it would
have won the entire $2 million prize. As it stands, the remaining $1.1 million in prize money
remains available for future competitions, contest organizers said.
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