Michael West’s Blog

This past week was a sombre reminder that the development, testing and use of space technology can be a very dangerous business. Sadly, 3 people were killed and 3 others critically injured after a blast at a Scaled Composites test site in the Mojave Desert, California. Scaled Composites are one of the new breed of private space launch/tourism companies and won the X-Prize a few years back with the SpaceShipOne craft. The follow on vehicle, SpaceShipTwo, is to form the basis of Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Galatic space tourism business. More info on the accident can be found on the SMH’s site here.

Although this is the first major accident involving these new space enterprises, it will by no means be the last. Why? Simply because the physics and chemistry involved in rocket science is extreme and pushes the limits of man and machine. Furthermore, spacecraft systems are often incredibly complex, for example the Saturn V had over a million individual systems that had to all work together for the first and only time when on the launch pad. As complexity increases, so do the risks. Everyone in the business knows and accepts these risks, unfortunately sometimes we take our eyes off the ball and it has awful consequences as evidenced by these tragic events.

On Sunday afternoon I headed to Canberra Stadium to see Sydney FC take on the Central Coast Mariners in the A-League Pre-Season Cup. It was a good game which the Mariners won 3-0. There is a good overview of the match on the Football in the Capital blog. There was also a reasonable turn out of some 5,700 people which isn’t bad given how bitterly cold it was. Here are some of the other photos I took…

Not that I care too much for Victorian politics but Steve Bracks has just quit politics after 8 years as Premier. Kudos to the ABC News site for being the first out with the news here. Bracks apparently cites personal reasons for his resignation, which probably includes his son’s recent drink driving adventure. I admire Bracks for recently sticking it to the Howard Government over control of the Murray-Darling Basin, particularly when it seems the that he and Malcolm Turnball were close to negotiating a solution, which the Prime Minister overruled just to score some political points. It seems the attempts at Federalism by Howard et al will leave them with egg on their face, even if the High Court was to uphold the Commonwealth’s position because it will leave no one with total control of water in the Basin. It will be divided between the States and the Commonwealth which is just as bad as it is now.

Anyway, good luck to Bracks in his new life outside the political sphere. I wonder how long until he is consulting for Macquaire Bank or similar, like another former Labor state Premier.

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The past 4 weeks have been pretty hectic and the last week has been just plain awful (more on that later). It probably best to start at the beginning. So far this month has consisted of …

• Christina and I had an engagement party in Sydney (which was great) and then another one in Canberra the next afternoon (which was also great). Photos are coming soon.
• The upgrades on the vacuum chamber for the HDLT were finally finished allowing me to reassemble everything (about 2 weeks of work) and attempt to get experiments underway. More on that in my next post.
• I had a French engineering student shadow me at work for a week. It was good to have the extra set of hands to help with things, but keeping him busy was draining.
• I’ve been off to the physio on average twice a week for treatment on my hand, which is improving so at last I can return to goalkeeping duties. My two games playing in defense were admirable but contained moments of madness including conceding a direct free kick for a tackle in the box. Fortunately our substitute keeper saved it (and my dignity).
• Canberra was forecast to get snow down to 500 metres (basically everywhere) and it didn’t. Such an anti-climax. All we got instead were a few nights at -6 deg C and a nice white blanket on the ranges.
• I traveled to Brisbane for Christina and my final engagement party. After some running around to organise things the day before it all went smoothly and was also good. I even made raspberry & white chocolate muffins from scratch (under Christina’s guidance)!! Photos coming soon as well.
• I’ve been staying up to watch the Socceroos woeful performance thus far in the Asian Cup. Thankfully they rediscovered playing professionally and beat Thailand to progress to a quarter-final showdown against Japan.
• Finally, I got the reviewer’s comments back on my first journal paper. Their comments were positive but much work is required to get all the changes they requested done.

The photo above is a of brushtail possum that was perched in one of the trees outside the Research School of Physical Sciences & Engineering where I work. The poor thing looked pretty cold and was happy to sleep there most of the day. Even the noise from the workshops didn’t trouble it.

I went and saw Transformers at the cinema last night with some work friends and my house mates. It was awesome! One of the best action movies I have seen. The special effects were amazing and very smoothly integrated and there were heaps of explosions and cool car and aircraft chases. Rating - 5/5.