Sep 15, 2010

Beth Dickey Headquarters, Washington 202-358-2087 beth dickey-1@nasa gov

Gray Creech NASA Dryden Flight Research Center 661-276-2662 gray creech@nasa gov

MEDIA ADVISORY: M10-132

NASA HOSTING LIVE BILINGUAL WEB CHAT WITH DRONE PILOT

WASHINGTON -- NASA invites the public to join a bilingual online chat on Thursday, Sept 23 The chat is NASA's first hosted in Spanish and English on the agency's website

Participants in the live chat will be able to interact in English and Spanish with NASA pilot Herman Posada He pilots the agency's unique Ikhana and Global Hawk unmanned aircraft into dangerous conditions such as wildfires and hurricanes When Posada sits at the controls and flies the aircraft, he is not in their cockpits, but at a ground station miles away He uses a joystick and video monitors to control the vehicles

Ikhana, a Predator B modified for non-military missions, carries instruments for environmental Earth science studies It also is used for advanced aircraft systems research and technology development The Global Hawk has been very busy this hurricane season collecting tropical storm data

The event is tentatively scheduled to begin at 3 p m EDT from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in California, and it will last approximately one hour The time and date is subject to change due to tropical storm research flights For the chat schedule, Ikhana and Global Hawk images and video, and to participate with Posada, visit:

http://www nasa gov/connect/chat/uas_pilot_chat html

-end-

To subscribe to the list, send a message to: hqnews-subscribe@mediaservices nasa gov To remove your address from the list, send a message to: hqnews-unsubscribe@mediaservices nasa gov

The following information is a reminder of your current mailing list subscription:

You are subscribed to the following list: [list_name]

using the following email: example@example.com

You may automatically unsubscribe from this list at any time by visiting the following URL:

https://aus-city com/cgi-bin/dada/mail cgi/u/NASA_REPORTS/example/example com/

If the above URL is inoperable, make sure that you have copied the entire address Some mail readers will wrap a long URL and thus break this automatic unsubscribe mechanism

You may also change your subscription by visiting this list's main screen:

<[program_url]/list/[list]>

If you're still having trouble, please contact the list owner at:

<mailto:[list_owner_email]>

The following physical address is associated with this mailing list:

[physical_address]