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Multidisciplinary
Design, Analysis, and
Optimization Branch
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EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES: THE NASA AEROQUIZ
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Week of 6/5/00:
Q:
It seems pilots use more slang than people of most other professions!
Here are a few aviator slang terms. Whoever translates them best wins
this week's Aeroquiz!
Bingo, deadstick, pickle, FOD, bandit, AGL, hangar queen,
feet wet/dry, envelope.
No one got the correct answer! The question stands another week!
- The Aeroquiz Editor
Week of 6/12/00:
Q:
It seems pilots use more slang than people of most other professions!
Here are a few aviator slang terms. Whoever translates them best wins
this week's Aeroquiz!
Bingo, deadstick, pickle, FOD, bandit, AGL, hangar queen,
feet wet/dry, envelope.
A:
Bingo - The minimum fuel level plus reserves for a safe return to a ship or
an airfield. Aircraft can fly and fight past bingo fuel in combat
situations, but at considerable peril.
Deadstick - Flying without engine power.
Pickle - The button to release ordnance. Or to push the button.
FOD - Foreign Object Damage. A constant concern on airfields and
carrier decks where jet engines operate. Jet intakes can ingest loose
objects, and even the smallest item can seriously damage jet fan blades.
Bandit - An enemy aircraft.
AGL - Above Ground Level. Used in reference to altitude, e.g. 5000 ft AGL.
Hangar queen - Always out of service for maintenance.
Feet wet/dry - Radio brevity code for crossing from over-land to over-water
flight or vice versa.
Envelope - The maximum performance parameters and operating limits
of an aircraft.
Congratulations to Daniel Shedd.
Week of 6/19/00:
Q:
Here are a few more aviation slang terms -- part 2 of 2!
It seems pilots use more slang than people of most other professions!
Here are a few aviator slang terms. Whoever translates them best wins
this week's Aeroquiz!
Angels, cherubs, furball, bounce, ELINT, military power, bolter,
dirty aircraft, zero dark thirty.
A:
Angels - US Navy term for altitude. Given in thousands of feet, so
"angels 6" represents 6000 feet.
Cherubs - Altitude under 1000 feet, measured in hundreds of feet
("cherubs two" means 200 feet).
Furball- A thickly populated dogfight.
Bounce - An unexpected attack on another aircraft.
ELINT - ELectronic INTelligence. Intelligence gained through analysis
of electronic signals.
Military Power - Maximum jet engine power without engaging afterburner.
Bolter - A carrier landing attempt in which the tailhook fails to engage
any of the arresting wires, requiring a "go-around," and in which the
aircraft landing gear contacts the deck. Otherwise it is a "low pass."
Dirty Aircraft - An aircraft configured for landing with gear and flaps down.
Zero-Dark-Thirty - Technically a half-hour after midnight, but commonly
used to describe any event that is scheduled to take place after midnight and
before sunrise.
Congratulations to Daniel Shedd.
Week of 6/26/00:
Q:
NASA always refers to the weightless free fall environment
of space as microgravity. We've all seen astronauts
and objects floating around inside the Space Shuttle cabin.
It sure looks like zero gravity, doesn't it?
Why don't we just say zero gravity?
A:
Technically, we would be lying. Zero gravity implies the absence of all
acceleration, which is virtually impossible to achieve. We can, however,
minimize accelerations to the microgravity range on the shuttle and
in various ground based facilites. This leads to the more accurate
and truthful name "microgravity."
Congratulations to Eric Baumann.
Since gravity is, of course, always present, "microgravity" might be more
appropriately named "microacceleration."
In fact, there are all sorts of small forces acting on
spacecraft in orbital free fall. There are small accelerations
due to other gravitationally-attracting bodies (like the sun and
moon), atmospheric drag, the non-spherical shape and non-homogeneous
makeup of the Earth, solar radiation pressure, magnetic fields,
distributed shape effects of the spacecraft itself, and even
relativistic effects. Although small, these accelerations
can perturb a spacecraft trajectory significantly over time. Ignoring
these perturbations for a typical Earth satellite would eventually
result in a tracking position failure.
- The Aeroquiz Editor
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