If you’re planning to visit the western coast of France anytime soon, be sure to keep an eye out for a 40-foot-tall mechanical elephant. Perhaps taking inspiration from steampunk fiction and Jules Verne, French engineers, artists, and craftspeople have cobbled together a movable mammoth using 45 tons worth of reclaimed wood and steel.
The Great Elephant is part of the Machines of the Isle of Nantes project, and exhibit of fantastical creations, which aims to inspire the imaginations of citizens and tourists alike. And it’s not just for decoration, either: this robust creature can carry up to 49 passengers on a 45-minute walk around the city of Nantes.
Bathrooms may dispose of waste, but they create it, too: The average person flushes the toilet five times a day, using between 8 and 35 gallons of water. Not only that, but Americans each use about 50 pounds of toilet paper every year.
Now, thanks to Tom Broadbent, an industrial design graduate from De Montfort University in Leicester, UK, bathrooms may start impacting the environment in more positive ways by becoming power generators.
The Solar Impulse HB-SIA, with André Borschberg at its controls, successfully landed this morning after flying for more than 26 hours.
The plane was in the air the all day and all night, relying entirely on solar energy. The flight is the longest and highest in the history of solar aviation.
Now, Swiss pilot André Borscherg is attempting the world’s first manned 24-hour flight in a solar-powered aircraft, which began this morning when he took off in the Solar Impulse HB-SIA.
The plane, which is equipped with 12,000 solar cells on its wings, will attempt to fly both during the light of day and the dark of night. If this mission is successful, it will be the longest and highest flight ever made by a solar plane.
Improvised explosive devices (IEDs), also known as roadside bombs, are the deadliest threat facing U.S. troops in the Afghanistan War and they are the weapon of choice for many insurgent groups.
To better protect U.S. troops from IEDs, civilian mechanics at the Anniston Army Depot in Alabama have built the Assault Breacher Vehicle – a 64-ton tank nicknamed “the Shredder.”
Is Spider Man’s wall-climbing ability impossible outside comic books? One 13-year-old certainly didn’t think so. Hibiki Kono of Cambridge, England has created his own wall-scaling suction device for a school project using recycled vacuum cleaners. Check it out:
One of the greatest challenges and sources of opportunity for modern engineers is thinking up ways to repurpose the waste material that pervades our planet. Many organizations are already finding clever ways to tackle this issue. For example, every year the PBS show Design Squad holds a “Trash to Treasure” competition, which challenges students to design something useful produced from waste materials. Now meet Waste for Life, a non-profit coalition of students, designers, and engineers who are working in Argentina and Lesotho to upcycle waste into usable materials:
Bathrooms may dispose of waste, but they create it, too: The average person flushes the toilet five times a day, using between 8 and 35 gallons of water. Not only that, but Americans each use about 50 pounds of toilet paper every year.
We previously reported that the 
