Covered By The Clouds (10/12-10/18)

This week was surprisingly disheartening. Through the research assessment and my interviews in the last week, I realized how niche of a field structural spacecraft design truly is. Through my intensive research within and outside of some of the largest databases available for free on the internet, I finally concluded that resources available to the general public on spacecraft design was largely lacking. I already had understood the fact - which is why my original work proposal involved a design to overcome this obstacle - but it was difficult to come to terms with. While I may not be able to learn much about the process involving designing the external structure of a spacecraft at the moment, I learned that there is a wide array of information on the internal components of a spacecraft. I am inspired by challenges, which is why I will put forth the same quality of work into learning about a different topic despite it not being my first choice. I will need to redistribute my time and effort in order to identify what exactly I want to focus on in regards to the internal components making up a spacecraft. The article I read recently for the research assignment this week provided various other articles with potentially helpful information that I should look into. Speaking of helpful information, despite having my interviews last week, the interview assessment I wrote this week gave me the opportunity to review my experience. I interviewed a total of three professionals, all employed in different disciplines of the aerospace engineering industry, which gave me an insight into the professional workplace. I asked each of them what they believed to be the future of aerospace engineering, and notable answers consisted of increases in efficiency, unmanned flight, electric/environmentally-friendly powered machines, supersonic speed/beyond, and space. I think that receiving an assessment of the future expansion of the aerospace industry directly from working individuals is my greatest success. To me, space and unmanned flight to be the most intriguing topics, but as to what I can achieve is left to be discovered. All I can do at the moment is pick myself up again and keep working hard, until I find myself beyond the gray curtain that currently hangs over me.