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Unnatural Air Feature Spotlight
The Cruise Airship
Be prepared to see new blimps in our skies. This style aircraft is called The Manned Cloud. It is a flying hotel designed by a Frenchman named Jean-Marei Massaud. From this gliding hotel, guests will be observing the earth from above. This flying hotel can accommodate up to 40 guests and about 15 staff members to run the show. It will be a helium filled balloon with propulsion that will give it a top speed of 170 km/h. Although it's normal cruise speed will be around 130 km/h. I'm sure the guests will appreciate that when they are sun-bathing on the top, where it will have a sun deck for guest who want to lay about in the open on their cruise. Like on a cruise ship, but in the air traveling 130 km/h.
Just as any hotel might have, this craft will accommodate guests with a restaurant, library, and fitness center complete with a spa. The Air Cruise Ship is being built and will be completed in the near future. It would be hard to imagine sitting on your front porch and seeing this thing fly by. It's length is about 2 football fields.
Technical characteristics:
Capacity 40 passengers & 15 crew members
Volume 520.000 m3
Dimensions L 210m · W 82m · H 52 m
First deck 500 m2 Restaurant, lounge, library, fitness
Second deck 600 m2 20 rooms, terraces, spa, bar
Range 5000 km ⁄ 72 h.
Maximum speed 170 km7⁄h
Cruising speed 130 km⁄h
expected launch date 2020.
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Unnatural Air Highlight
Largest Aircraft In The World
The An-225 is the biggest aircraft in the world to reach our skies more then once. It is larger than the Airbus A380 airliner and the C-5 Galaxy, that are both heavy aircraft. I have found conflicting reports, one saying there was only 1 built, and another saying there was 2 built. This aircraft design almost makes a perfect square at almost 300 feet wide and 300 feet long. Below we have provided a link, if you would like to see this monster plane take off.
Wingspan............290 Ft.
Height: 89.4 Ft.
Length: 276 Ft
Number of wheels: 24
Max T.O. Weight: 1,322,750 lbs. Over 660 Tons.
Max payload: 551,150 lbs. Over 275 Tons
Engines: 6 Lotarev D–18T turbofans
Max speed: 530 MPH 
Cruise speed: 495 MPH
Range: 8,310 Miles
Want to see it take-off?
An-225 Take-Off
All recommended no load time
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Unnatural Air Topic
The Discovery Shuttle spacecraft left Kennedy Space Center on mission STS-124, May 31 2008. This mission directive was to take a pressurized module and a robotic arm and deliver it to the Japanese Experiment Module for their Kibo Laboratory. There were three launches scheduled to complete this mission...STS-124 was the second of the three. This mission included three spacewalks and attaching the arm to the new laboratory. This was the 26th shuttle mission, commanded by Navy Commander Mark Kelly, to the International Space Station.
Want to see it launch? Launch Space Shuttle
Only recommended for DSL or cable 1-2 min load time
NEXT SHUTTLE MISSIONS:
Date: May 14
Mission: STS-132
Launch Vehicle: Space Shuttle Atlantis
Launch Site: Kennedy Space Center - Launch Pad 39A
Launch Time: 2:20 p.m. EDT
Description: Space shuttle Atlantis mission will carry an integrated cargo carrier to deliver maintenance and
assembly hardware, including spare parts for space station systems. In addition, the second in a series of new
pressurized components for Russia, a Mini Research Module, will be permanently attached to the bottom port of
the Zarya module.
Date: Sept. 16
Mission: STS-133
Launch Vehicle: Space Shuttle Discovery
Launch Site: Kennedy Space Center - Launch Pad 39A
Launch Time: 11:57 a.m. EDT
STS-133 Description: Space shuttle Discovery will deliver the Express Logistics Carrier 4 (ELC4), a Multi-
Purpose Logistics Module (MLPM) and critical spare components to the International Space Station.
Date: Mid-Nov.
Mission: STS-134
Launch Vehicle: Space Shuttle Endeavour
Launch Site: Kennedy Space Center - Launch Pad 39A
Launch Time: To Be Determined
STS-134 Description: Space shuttle Endeavour will deliver an EXPRESS Logistics Carrier-3 (ELC-3) and an Alpha
Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) to the International Space Station.
Date: Nov. 22
Mission: Glory
Launch Vehicle: Orbital Sciences Taurus Rocket
Launch Site: Vandenberg Air Force Base - Launch Pad SLC 576-E
Description: The Glory Mission will help increase our understanding of the Earth's energy balance by collecting
data on the properties of aerosols and black carbon in the Earth's atmosphere and how the Sun's irradiance
affects the Earth's climate.
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NASA Orbital Debris Program
 
The two photos here are images generated by a computer, of objects in Earth orbit and they are currently being kept track of. About 95% of the objects in the pictures are orbital debris, non-functional satellites. The dots represent each items location. These dots are scaled according to the image, and are not scaled to the size of the Earth in the image. This is to optimize their visibility for this article. These two images provide a good visualization of where the greatest debris populations accumulated. Here are the graphics generated from two different view points. A close view for low orbit debris and a distant view of the "bigger picture". Currently there are over 36,091 dying and dead satellites orbiting our earth as of November 2009.
more information here:
orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov
SATCAT Boxscore Current as of 2004 May 26
PAYLOADS
On Orbit Decayed Total
2,982 2,675 5,657
DEBRIS
On Orbit Decayed Total
6,316 16,315 22,631
ALL
On Orbit Decayed Total
9,298 18,990 28,288
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SATCAT Boxscore Current as of 2009 Nov 18
PAYLOADS
On Orbit Decayed Total
3,283 2,771 6,054 as of 2008 Sept 05
3,398 2,798 6,196 as of 2009 Nov 18
DEBRIS
On Orbit Decayed Total
9,783 17,478 27,261 as of 2008 Sept 05
11,890 18,005 29,895 as of 2009 Nov 18
ALL
On Orbit Decayed Total
13,066 20,249 33,315 as of 2008 Sept 05
15,288 20,803 36,091 as of 2009 Nov 18
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Between September 2008 and November 2009 there has been an added 2776 new satellites put into orbit. That is 2776 new pieces of debris in 14 months. If this continues into the year 2023, there will be an added 38,808 objects of debris, more than doubling the current level to 74,899 pieces of:
- satellites
- dying satellites
- dead satellites
- decayed satellites
- debris
By the year 2050 there would be a whopping 150,000 pieces of debris making the above image demonstration, look more like the images below.
 
more information here:
www.celestrak.com
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Planet Earth...
our children's future.
