What steps could have been taken to avert the shuttle disaster?

[SoylentGreen]

In passing interest about the shuttle program and space travel inself, for years I have known that the most heavy-duty tiles are needed on the nose and wingtips of the shuttle.
A large piece of insulation breaks off hitting the craft when it is traveling several thousand miles an hour and the engineers blow it off?

They should be shown on TV and shamed. :|

 

[charrison]

Originally posted by: Kiyup
In passing interest about the shuttle program and space travel inself, for years I have known that the most heavy-duty tiles are needed on the nose and wingtips of the shuttle.
A large piece of insulation breaks off hitting the craft when it is traveling several thousand miles an hour and the engineers blow it off?

They should be shown on TV and shamed. :|

Zero Gravity bondo?

 

[BoberFett]

Why don't you head the space program yourself? Obviously you know more than those currently working on it.

 

[SoylentGreen]

Originally posted by: BoberFett
Why don't you head the space program yourself? Obviously you know more than those currently working on it.

Thank you for you most sarcastic comment. You can go away now.

Maybe you live in a cave. The shuttle burned up in the atmosphere.

 

[loup garou]

Originally posted by: BoberFett
Why don't you head the space program yourself? Obviously you know more than those currently working on it.

Yeah! It's not like it's rocket scie....oh wait...

 

[tcsenter]

Call me crazy, but in order to have a remotely productive discussion on what measures could have prevented or averted the Shuttle disaster, don't you think it would be a good idea to first wait for some kind of conclusion of the investigation into the cause of the Shuttle disaster?

I know, its a pretty insane idea! I'm crazy like that, man. You never know what sort of freaky sh-t I'm going to say next.

 

[HombrePequeno]

I think the best way to have averted the shuttle disaster was to give NASA adequate funding to build a next generation space shuttle.

 

[SoylentGreen]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
Call me crazy, but in order to have a remotely productive discussion on what measures could have prevented or averted the Shuttle disaster, don't you think it would be a good idea to first wait for some kind of conclusion of the investigation into the cause of the Shuttle disaster?

I know, its a pretty insane idea! I'm crazy like that, man. You never know what sort of freaky sh-t I'm going to say next.

Yea, ok. The challenger final word for what happened took a year or about so?
Anyone watching that launch could see the jet of fire emanating from the solid rocket booster igniting the main fuel tank.

Same thing will happen here.

Again I say, the nose and front of wings have the highest temperature on entry.

 

[Zim Hosein]

Originally posted by: werk

Originally posted by: BoberFett
Why don't you head the space program yourself? Obviously you know more than those currently working on it.

Yeah! It's not like it's rocket scie....oh wait...

Kiyup, right now, the insulation theory is just that, a theory that NASA has.

 

[Ryan]

Until you work for Nasa and ar a Rocket Scientist, I don't think your uneducated opinion really matters. As of right now, a cause has yet to be found (it will more than likely be multiple factors), and until then you can't comment on something you don't know about.

 

[SoylentGreen]

Originally posted by: rbloedow
Until you work for Nasa and ar a Rocket Scientist, I don't think your uneducated opinion really matters. As of right now, a cause has yet to be found (it will more than likely be multiple factors), and until then you can't comment on something you don't know about.

Thanks a lot. I posted it here, not in the NASA boardroom meeting.

 

[PowerEngineer]

Originally posted by: Kiyup
In passing interest about the shuttle program and space travel inself, for years I have known that the most heavy-duty tiles are needed on the nose and wingtips of the shuttle.
A large piece of insulation breaks off hitting the craft when it is traveling several thousand miles an hour and the engineers blow it off?

They should be shown on TV and shamed. :|

Actually the shuttle "flys" with its belly nearly perpendicular to its direction of flight during the hottest portion of reentry, which is why its entire underside is covered with tiles. It may well be that some tiles were damaged by the insulation that broke off from the tank (but that's far from proven right now). If the problem was tile damage, it's far more likely to have been to tiles on the underside of the left wing than to wingtips or nose.

And I always enjoy hearing the ravings from know-it-all's like yourself, who have neither the wits or the intellectual honesty of the engineers and scientists who must make the decisions need to advance these kinds of leading edge technologies. It's your ilk that should be shown on TV and ridiculed...oh, that's right -- I forgot about the Jay Walk All-Stars -- never mind!

:disgust:

 

[SoylentGreen]

Originally posted by: PowerEngineer

Originally posted by: Kiyup
In passing interest about the shuttle program and space travel inself, for years I have known that the most heavy-duty tiles are needed on the nose and wingtips of the shuttle.
A large piece of insulation breaks off hitting the craft when it is traveling several thousand miles an hour and the engineers blow it off?

They should be shown on TV and shamed. :|

Actually the shuttle "flys" with its belly nearly perpendicular to its direction of flight during the hottest portion of reentry, which is why its entire underside is covered with tiles. It may well be that some tiles were damaged by the insulation that broke off from the tank (but that's far from proven right now). If the problem was tile damage, it's far more likely to have been to tiles on the underside of the left wing than to wingtips or nose.

And I always enjoy hearing the ravings from know-it-all's like yourself, who have neither the wits or the intellectual honesty of the engineers and scientists who must make the decisions need to advance these kinds of leading edge technologies. It's your ilk that should be shown on TV and ridiculed...oh, that's right -- I forgot about the Jay Walk All-Stars -- never mind!

:disgust:

I repeat. I posted it here, and didn't bring my extensive knowledge to the NASA boardroom.

 

[PowerEngineer]

I repeat. I posted it here, and didn't bring my extensive knowledge to the NASA boardroom.

Perhaps you should try to bring a little more knowledge to your posts here too. You think this is a men's room wall?

 

[SoylentGreen]

Originally posted by: PowerEngineer

I repeat. I posted it here, and didn't bring my extensive knowledge to the NASA boardroom.

Stop being a pompous ass, thank you.

Hindsight is 20/20. The shuttle burned up on re-entry.

And you don't know jack, since the leading edges get the most heat, including the nose and wings. So STFU please.

 

[hamburglar]

dude your harsh in responses that people give you. I don't think anyone knows the answer to this yet.

 

[MikeyIs4Dcats]

Originally posted by: Kiyup


Stop being a pompous ass, thank you.

Talking to yourself again?

Indications are that the engineers spent many days reviewing the details and performed an analysis that determined the likely size and extent of the damage. Based on their knowledge the felt it was not an issue.

What would you have rather they done? Called for an immediate abort of the mission before the shuttle reached orbit?

 

[OS]

well, for starters, it'd be nice if each shuttle mission from now on carried the necessary docking equipment to station at the ISS. Plus factor enough fuel into each mission to get there.

Also cut down on shuttle crews to 3-4 people. I seriously doubt all seven people were necessary personnel.

 

[yellowperil]

I read a journal article about the Challenger disaster a while back. It looked at internal memos and essentially the scientists said it was too dangerous to launch that morning but because of bureaucratic reasons they did it anyway. I'm not sure if that was a factor here but there have been stories about there being a lack of qualified scientists at NASA recently.

 

[Electric Amish]

I pretty much think they did all they could do until they have proper docking and repair/building facilities in space that would allow them to assess any damage and make repairs.

It would be interesting to see how many shuttle trips have been made successfully to compare to these TWO failures.

These shuttles have been flying mach 3000 through blazing re-entry after re-entry how many times successfully??

Personally, I think NASA doing a pretty fscking good job (in regards to the shuttle missions...we'll leave Mars outta this ), yet all they get is sh!t when something goes wrong.

amish

 

[SoylentGreen]

Originally posted by: Electric Amish
I pretty much think they did all they could do until they have proper docking and repair/building facilities in space that would allow them to assess any damage and make repairs.

It would be interesting to see how many shuttle trips have been made successfully to compare to these TWO failures.

These shuttles have been flying mach 3000 through blazing re-entry after re-entry how many times successfully??

Personally, I think NASA doing a pretty fscking good job (in regards to the shuttle missions...we'll leave Mars outta this ), yet all they get is sh!t when something goes wrong.

amish

The only reason the Mars missions are failing is because the Martians have been shooting down the satellites.

 

[XZeroII]

Aren't you the one who just installed AOL?

 

[Hammer]

well i dont think tile damage is something they could repair in space. I suppose if they though it was serious enough that they couldn't land, they could dock at the ISS, stay for a bit longer, until a replacement shuttle could be launched, and then abandon the first shuttle.

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: yellowperil
I read a journal article about the Challenger disaster a while back. It looked at internal memos and essentially the scientists said it was too dangerous to launch that morning but because of bureaucratic reasons they did it anyway. I'm not sure if that was a factor here but there have been stories about there being a lack of qualified scientists at NASA recently.

I had an engineering ethics class which largely focused on Challenger and it was basically a problem in management and beaucracy.

For several years, there had been a correlation between cold weather launches and O ring failures. The night before Challenger, the forecast expected extremely cold launch conditions and a couple engineers at Morton-Thiokol (manufacturer of the twin solid fuel booster rockets), relayed a message to NASA to suspend the launch. However, the management at Morton-Thiokol had their contract at stake based on continued launches and the management overrode the decision the engineers made and recommended a launch to NASA.

ed, being an eng i can't spell

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: Hammer
well i dont think tile damage is something they could repair in space. I support if they though it was serious enough that they couldn't land, they could dock at the ISS, stay for a bit longer, until a replacement shuttle could be launched, and then abandon the first shuttle.

That's pretty much what I was thinking. You don't even need to send up another shuttle, you can have the russians send a couple Soyuz capsules. They're much smaller and I think they hold 3 people.