MSNBC's "analysis" of Columbia damage and "rescue" options?!

[dudleydocker]

Correction:

It's a link to the article which is actually from the Washington Post:

From MSNBC website:

<<"As a result, ground controllers apparently did not consider the radical measures that might have saved the astronauts? lives ? aborting the mission soon after liftoff or bringing the shuttle in at a reentry angle that could have allowed the crew to parachute to safety.">>


Excuse me, but I highly doubt any of the ground controllers saw the debris hit right away and was in a position to decide in the TWO MINUTES for a return-to launch-site abort or Atlantic-abort before the shuttle was in orbit. Even if someone saw it, does the MSNBC author really think that NASA would have tried one of these options (neither of which have EVER been done before) and canned the entire mission? I believe the odds of a sucessful return-to launch-site abort are very low.

And as far as altering the reentry angle so the crew could parachute to safety.....Pardon me again, but reentry is reentry....there is no getting around the heat and speed of reentry by "going slower" or coming in at a different angle. And the ONLY time parachute escape is even an option is when the shuttle is in stable, level flight below 30,000 feet. NOT at 200,000 feet at mach 18.

I'm no science writer, but I have followed the space program for most of my life. I understand that highly complex tasks have to be explained in laymans terms.

But this is JUST PLAIN WRONG!! Why even place the idea out there that anything could have been done? Get your fvcking fact straight!
:|

 

[NFS4]

The debris was not seen until 1 day after launch when NASA was watching tapes of the launch.

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: dudleydocker
From their website:

<<"As a result, ground controllers apparently did not consider the radical measures that might have saved the astronauts? lives ? aborting the mission soon after liftoff or bringing the shuttle in at a reentry angle that could have allowed the crew to parachute to safety.">>


Excuse me, but I highly doubt any of the ground controllers saw the debris hit right away and was in a position to decide in the TWO MINUTES for a return-to launch-site abort or Atlantic-abort before the shuttle was in orbit. Even if someone saw it, does the MSNBC author really think that NASA would have tried one of these options (neither of which have EVER been done before) and canned the entire mission? I believe the odds of a sucessful return-to launch-site abort are very low.

And as far as altering the reentry angle so the crew could parachute to safety.....Pardon me again, but reentry is reentry....there is no getting around the heat and speed of reentry by "going slower" or coming in at a different angle.

I'm no science writer, but I have followed the space program for most of my life. I understand that highly complex tasks have to be explained in laymans terms.

But this is JUST PLAIN WRONG!! Why even place the idea out there that anything could have been done? Get your fvcking fact straight!
:|

The reentry angle thing is completely wrong. Supposedly if the angle is too shallow, reentering space craft will skip off the atmosphere back into space.

I'm not saying NASA couldn't have done anything (I think they could have), but the article seems wrong.

 

[Dudd]

It gets traffic to their site, and that's all they care about. The news is a for profit corporation, so they report what people want to hear.

 

[ElFenix]

journalists decided about 2 or 3 years ago that they had to be completely sensational and write stories with very little basis in reason or fact. much of it is as much "reality" as one of those "reality tv" shows like survivor.

 

[Armitage]

Linkage? Looks like complete crap to me.

 

[dudleydocker]

Correction: It's from the Washington Post

 

[HomeBrewerDude]

It is just the usual bit-wise reporting style that news agencies are using these days... You know, got to scream and shout about something facet of a news item every 5 minutes, regardless of any new information.

 

[308nato]

MSNBC is about to take a big dirt nap. Donahue failed to save them.

🙂😛

And how is Ashleigh holding up under the tragedy.....from Philly.com....


.....Ashleigh Banfield, a well-recognized reporter from MSNBC, berated a desk clerk at a downtown hotel as every room in the region was being rented.

"I have five rooms on the executive floor," she steamed. "I want my reservation honored."

In the men's room of the hotel bar, a guy at a urinal laughed, saying, "These reporters are jerks." He was the only nonreporter relieving himself.

 

[Amused]

What idiots. The shuttle already reenters the atmosphere at the shallowest angle possible to minimize heat.

Also, there is NO WAY the crew could survive a mach 18+ bailout. Hell, bailouts above mach one are 100% deadly. Mach 18??? Give me a break. The human body cannot withstand the forces involved.

 

[BooGiMaN]

I am really getting tired of armchair scientists and the media.
They feel as long as the put words like 'speculate' in from of their articles they can say whatever they want..
Heres is an idea for them..let the real experts do their job, when they are done im sure they will tell us what really happened.

 

[Queasy]

Journalism is just like television. You have to wade through tons of crap to come across a couple of gems.

 

[Dudd]

Originally posted by: 308nato
.....Ashleigh Banfield, a well-recognized reporter from MSNBC, berated a desk clerk at a downtown hotel as every room in the region was being rented.

"I have five rooms on the executive floor," she steamed. "I want my reservation honored."

How the hell is that being a jerk? I'd be pretty pissed off too if I had a reservation, only to have my room taken away.

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: Amused
What idiots. The shuttle already reenters the atmosphere at the shallowest angle possible to minimize heat.

yeah when you think about it, the columbia was over TX when disaster hit and they were going back to FL. That's a pretty freaking shallow reentry. :Q

 

[Queasy]

Originally posted by: OS

Originally posted by: Amused
What idiots. The shuttle already reenters the atmosphere at the shallowest angle possible to minimize heat.

yeah when you think about it, the columbia was over TX when disaster hit and they were going back to FL. That's a pretty freaking shallow reentry. :Q

If I remember correctly, re-entry starts somewhere over India. (Someone please correct me if I'm wrong).

 

[308nato]

Originally posted by: Dudd

Originally posted by: 308nato
.....Ashleigh Banfield, a well-recognized reporter from MSNBC, berated a desk clerk at a downtown hotel as every room in the region was being rented.

"I have five rooms on the executive floor," she steamed. "I want my reservation honored."

How the hell is that being a jerk? I'd be pretty pissed off too if I had a reservation, only to have my room taken away.

I don't even know if the wench had a reservation. She's a 2 bit hack reporter for a network that is about to be cancelled because more people are viewing local cable access than MSNBC at any given time. With all the real people needing rooms, such as FBI, NASA, NTSB, military personnel etc., she could maybe trim it down to 2 rooms if she actually had a reservation.

I'm sure her head and glasses could fit in 2 rooms.

 

[everman]

<<"As a result, ground controllers apparently did not consider the radical measures that might have saved the astronauts? lives ? aborting the mission soon after liftoff or bringing the shuttle in at a reentry angle that could have allowed the crew to parachute to safety.">>

LMAO What is this, they have their own staff of self proclaimed rocket scientists?

Lets see, abort takeoff after seeing debris = death. ok that's not good, lets look at option two. Different angle, hrm well we can either take the angle of burn up faster, or the angle of ricochet off the Earth's atmosphere into oblivion. wow well it looks like option two isn't good either.

I'm tired of all of these know nothing news commentators acting like they even have a clue.

 

[PG]

<<"As a result, ground controllers apparently did not consider the radical measures that might have saved the astronauts? lives ? aborting the mission soon after liftoff or bringing the shuttle in at a reentry angle that could have allowed the crew to parachute to safety.">>

If they did some sort of early abortion of the launch what happens to the solid rocket boosters? Can you imagine those suckers being let loose from the shuttle early? What if they decided to take a turn and shoot down toward all the people watching the takeoff?

 

[Armitage]

Originally posted by: Amused
What idiots. The shuttle already reenters the atmosphere at the shallowest angle possible to minimize heat.

Also, there is NO WAY the crew could survive a mach 18+ bailout. Hell, bailouts above mach one are 100% deadly. Mach 18??? Give me a break. The human body cannot withstand the forces involved.

Actually, there is a case where a US AF pilot punched out of an F15 while supersonic. Saw this story in print at least 5 years ago, and a quick googling didn't turn it up. Was an amazing story, the guy was seriously messed up, but survived & flew again.

That was somewhere between M1 and M2. I think the F111 capsule was designed for supersonic ejections also.

Still, there's a huge difference between Mach 2 @ < 70K ft and M16 @ 200000K ft

 

[dudleydocker]

<<"Lets see, abort takeoff after seeing debris = death. ok that's not good, lets look at option two. Different angle, hrm well we can either take the angle of burn up faster, or the angle of ricochet off the Earth's atmosphere into oblivion. wow well it looks like option two isn't good either.">>

You quoted me screaming at my TV!!!!

I've decided that I'm just gonna turn the sound off from now on and look at the pretty pictures........

 

[dudleydocker]

<<"If they did some sort of early abortion of the launch what happens to the solid rocket boosters? Can you imagine those suckers being let loose from the shuttle early? What if they decided to take a turn and shoot down toward all the people watching the takeoff?">>

A return-to-launch-site (RTLS) abort must occurr very early in a flight. I think the scenario was developed for losing two or all three main liquid fueled engines very shortly after take-off. Not enough oomph to get across the Atlantic so turn around and come back. Like I said, never been done, and I don't think any of the commanders or pilots would want to have to try it. BTW, the "window" for an RTLS to be done is very short, meaning that the Shuttle isn't in the air for long before it already has enough momentum for a parabolic flight over the Atalntic and land in Spain. Pretty impressive...

As far as the solid rocket boosters go, they would be explosively separated from the shuttle/tank stack even while still burning (remember Challenger in 1986? The shuttle and tank blew up and the two solids went cork-screwing in different directions). The range safety officer would then send a destroy command to the solids (as was done with Challenger). I think it's explosive charges up and down the length of the boosters and it just "zips" them open and they fall into the sea.

 

[Armitage]

These idiots aren't even consistant with their own article...

"Over the next two weeks, engineers pored over film clips of the launch and used modeling techniques to guess at the extent and location of the damage"

"As a result, ground controllers apparently did not consider the radical measures that might have saved the astronauts' lives -- aborting the mission soon after liftoff or bringing the shuttle in at a reentry angle that could have allowed the crew to parachute to safety."

If it took them two weeks to analyze the situation, how could they make a reasonable decision to abort in the seconds they had during liftoff?

As for the reentry angle ... I've got to believe that the shuttle already comes in at the optimum angle wrt heat, stress, etc. Maybe they could have tweaked it a bit to favor an area with known tile damage though.

But actually, beyond those bonehead statements, the rest of the article is pretty good.

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: ergeorge

Originally posted by: Amused
What idiots. The shuttle already reenters the atmosphere at the shallowest angle possible to minimize heat.

Also, there is NO WAY the crew could survive a mach 18+ bailout. Hell, bailouts above mach one are 100% deadly. Mach 18??? Give me a break. The human body cannot withstand the forces involved.

Actually, there is a case where a US AF pilot punched out of an F15 while supersonic. Saw this story in print at least 5 years ago, and a quick googling didn't turn it up. Was an amazing story, the guy was seriously messed up, but survived & flew again.

That was somewhere between M1 and M2. I think the F111 capsule was designed for supersonic ejections also.

Still, there's a huge difference between Mach 2 @ < 70K ft and M16 @ 200000K ft

But the reality is, there is no escape capsule in the shuttle... and one freak, lucky surviver of a supersonic ejection does not make it possible, or any less deadly.