IRVE-3: Inflatable heat shield a splashing success
Wednesday, July 25, 2012 - 10:40
in Astronomy & Space
Three years of their hard work plunged in the Atlantic Ocean on July 23, and a group of NASA engineers could not have been more thrilled. They were part of the Inflatable Reentry Vehicle Experiment (IRVE-3) team that is working to develop an inflatable heat shield. The technology could be used to protect spacecraft when entering a planet's atmosphere or returning here to Earth.