THE SPACE SHUTTLE SITUATION: A Quick Guide For DU Citizens

[Emperor_Norton_II]

Okay, with the launch of Discovery on Tuesday and the grounding of the fleet on Wednesday, there's been a bit of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt regarding the status of the shuttle. In an attempt to keep things on a factual basis (and hopefully keep me from climbing the nearest tower with a gun) I'm going to set this up as a place where you fine folks can get some actual facts about what's going on.

WHAT WE KNOW

STS-114 lifted off Tuesday on a supply and maintenance mission to the International Space Station. Because of the incident that happened on STS-107 where a foam strike damaged the wing, over 100 different cameras were trained on the vehicle when it took off. As a result, the first three minutes of the flight were captured on film from literally every possible angle.

Review of the tape found that the launch was not entirely without incident. The first incident happened 2.5 seconds after launch, before the shuttle cleared the tower. Apparently a buzzard circling the launch tower zigged when it should have zagged and ran into the External Tank:



Neither the bird nor the shuttle were moving very fast at that point, and the bird impacted on the side opposite the orbiter. Shuttle 1, Buzzard 0.

The next incident happened during the first part of the ascent, before the Solid Rocket Boosters seperated. A fragment of tile roughly 1.5 inches across broke free from the orbiter along the rear edge of the nose landing gear door:



Why this happened has yet to be determined.

The last incident is the one that has everybody screaming. Shortly after the SRBs were jettisoned, a large chunk of foam from the ET peeled off and fell away:



The debris didn't hit the orbiter, but this was clearly Not Supposed To Happen. Imaging of the ET after it was jettisoned clearly showed the point of origin for the offending bit of foam:



The foam came from the Protuberance Air Load (PAL) ramp, which basically acts as a spoiler for the big pipe that runs down the side of the ET.

Further examination by both the shuttle crew and the ISS crew show no significant damage to Discovery. A second cracked tile was found lower on the orbiter's belly, but no further damage was seen.

Because of the PAL ramp foam discharge, NASA officials have decided to postpone future launches until they can fix the problem once and for all.

WHAT THIS MEANS

Okay, first thing this means, it means Discovery is fine. The shuttle itself has taken only the most minor damage, and will be able to reenter and land like it normally does. The little chip on the nose will not cause the orbiter to burn up. Shuttles have taken worse and survived, as this picture from STS-87 shows:



The next thing this means is there probably won't be any more shuttle missions this year. After Discovery lands, the fleet will stay on the ground until the tanks have been modified so they aren't shedding foam in large, dangerous chunks anymore. This will mean either replacing the PAL ramp with something not covered in foam, or moving the plumbing on the outside of the tank to the inside. Since this is a pretty significant redesign, it's likely that the shuttle won't fly again until the redesigned tanks are available.

What this means for the future of the program... well, it's too early to say one way or another. Another delay puts the shuttle that much closer to the planned retirement date, but the shuttle is necessary for completing the ISS. At this stage, my speculation is that the shuttle retirement will be pushed back by however long it's necessary to finish ISS Core Complete. But that is just speculation.

Okay. I've rambled on for far too long here. Hopefully this will help keep people from going "OMG! They're gonna die! :scared:" when the facts don't say that.

If anybody has any questions, I shall be glad to try and provide answers.

[Lars39]

1. Thank you,Emperor_Norton_II

:thumbsup:

[Beetwasher]

2. Cool, Thanks!

:thumbsup:

[DS1]

3. Space Shuttle Fabio?

:hide:

[Liberal In Texas]

4. Thanks for the update. Very clear and understandable. n/t

[ulysses]

5. superior thread. thank you!

A buzzard hit it? :wtf:

[Emperor_Norton_II]

7. There were a lot of birds out that day

If you watched the preflight footage on CSPAN or NASA-TV, you could see three or four buzzards circling the pad, catching thermals off all that lovely concrete in the Florida sun. Most of them cleared out when things really started to hiss and clank. One of 'em just was either too slow or too stupid to veer off when the engines fired up.

[pitohui]

30. better known as vultures no doubt

buzzard is not the correct term in the usa

is there a smiley for nitpick?

[jim3775]

6. Thank you norton,

I was thinking about throwing something like this together, it should also be pointed out that NASA never said the shuttle fleet was grounded in fact they made a special point of saying this at this morning’s press conference. Grounded is just news talk for what is normal procedure; if there is a problem discovered subsequent launches will be delayed until it is fixed.

[SaveElmer]

8. Excellent description of the situation...

Thanks!!!

[Emperor_Norton_II]

9. It helps to have pictures, I've found.

...and naturally the pics at CNN and the like are often too small to be of any use.

Thank you, Spaceflight Now! :)

[jim3775]

11. Spaceflightnow has probably recorded a million refreshes by me...

in the last few days.

[SaveElmer]

15. WHat do you think of Bush's space initiative...

I tell you I am conflicted...I have been waiting for some politician to commit to a return to the Moon and move to Mars since 1969...

The fact that it is Bush makes my skin crawl...I was hoping a Democrat would have had the courage to pick on on Kennedy and Johnson's vision

[Emperor_Norton_II]

19. I liked it better when it was called the Space Exploration Initiative..

..which is what it was called in 1989 when Bush the Elder first proposed it. Bush the Younger didn't exactly come up with anything new there, more's the pity. And it's not exactly a well-funded mandate, either.

I think we're probably better off waiting for Burt Rutan to put a man on Mars than waiting for NASA at this rate.

[SaveElmer]

21. You rright about the funding...

To me NASA is grossly underfunded...

[JHB]

22. Not a problem. There is no "Bush initiative".

He had a photo op so he could throw some fat contracts to supporters on NASA's tab, that's the extent of his "space initiative".

So it's still open for a Dem to take the lead in actually accomplishing anything in space.

[SaveElmer]

24. Well I hope one steps up!!!...nt

[Cleita]

72. I'm against Bush having anything to do with this even

though I am normally in favor of all space programs. My reasons are that you can be sure it will be a money pit for special interests and corporations with very little actual funding for any meaningful space programs.

[bridgit]

10. no, you're on it, it's time to ground the shuttle...

and move on to alternative vehicles already in planning stages, this is the second launch in a row that has developed this issue & after all the 'really smart boys & girls' having been looking right at this problem since the previous disaster. with the rickety old shuttle stopping everyone's heart, grand foray into engineering that it is, it is time to realize that presently; rockets are for satellites, rovers, sensoring equip & such imo

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

[XNASA]

12. Debris hits the orbiter all the time.

It gets hit with all kinds of things going uphill, coming down, and on orbit.

The media frenzy regarding the Shuttle is about what one would expect from the media.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

32. Do you suppose that it has anything to do with the last shuttle flight...

...that all the experts stated would be fine? You know, the one that spread itself across several states after breaking up on re-entry?

Or maybe it has to do with the fact that NASA is grounding the space shuttle fleet until further notice...could that be it?

Even the experts aren't willing to guarantee that this shuttle will be fine coming back.

[Emperor_Norton_II]

34. Minor point here

STS-114 had more cameras watching it than your average celebrity. If there was any serious damage to the orbiter, we would've seen it by now. We haven't seen it. QED.

Of course, if you'd read the OP you'd probably have seen that.

[XNASA]

35. Nothing is guaranteed when you work on the edge.

The only 'experts' work in Building 30 at the Johnson Space Center. And every person in the astronaut corps has complete faith in them.

And that's really the only thing that matters.

[uppityperson]

13. Thanks for the info and pictures. Are you a shuttle nerd?

thank you

[Emperor_Norton_II]

16. Guilty as charged

Grew up watching the shuttles fly. One of my oldest posessions is a 22 year old videotape that has the ABC coverage of STS-6, 7, 8 and 9 on it. I used to spend hours when I was kid watching that thing. I could never get enough of it. ;)

[MemphisTiger]

14. So is our space vehicle so fragile that a little bird could bring

it down? I realize if a bird gets sucked into a traditional prop or jet engine this is possible, but if it wacks the surface it is broke? I guess that's what we get for buying something from the lowest bidder.

[Emperor_Norton_II]

17. Okay, obviously you didn't read the OP.

The bird strike did precisely sod-all to the shuttle. Look at the photos again. The bird hit up at the top of the tank and on the other side from where the foam peeled away.

The bird didn't do any damage, and it wasn't a little bird by any stretch of the imagination. This was a buzzard:

[pitohui]

37. that is a turkey vulture

here's a buzzard:



a turkey vulture is almost certainly what struck the shuttle, buzzards are found in the old world, in the new world we call them buteos, red-tailed hawk would be an example

birders have been trying to stamp out the incorrect use of buzzard for a vulture for decades

the grammar police strike again :-)

[Emperor_Norton_II]

38. You'll get my American colloquialisms...

when you pry them from my cold, dead hands! ;)

[Lisa]

67. just to note, turkey vultures can have a +5' wingspan

... and weigh more than a kilo (twice as much as some redtails).

[Ranec]

18. What happens when we retire the shuttle?

Is there a next-generation space plane being planned?

Years ago, I had heard about a "new" shuttle, but nothing about that in a long while.

[Emperor_Norton_II]

23. That's an interesting question.

Next-generation spacecraft have been in the design pipeline for years now, and very few of them have ever gotten beyond the concept art stage. Generally, the budget for the shuttle replacement is one of the first things to get the axe whenever the budget gets crunched.

Right now, NASA is planning to retire the shuttle come hell or high water in 2010. They've solicited designs from various areospace companies for a crew-only vehicle that's supposed to be flying by 2008, but it's iffy whether or not they'll have the budget to proceed with bending metal on any of them:

[slutticus]

20. This is great. Thanks!

[DemoTex]

25. Emperor_Norton_II exemplifies the spirit of DU. Thank you!

Can you imagine ever finding a post like this at Freeperville?

[frictionlessO]

26. DU gold... good job!

Granted pics help to soothe bubbling fears, but this was truly an excellent example of a tactful way to help fellow community members see a different and very valid point of view.

I applaud your efforts!
:applause:

[Emperor_Norton_II]

27. Considering the alternative...

...was me going out with gun and knife and not stopping until I had me some heads, this was the easy choice.

Well, reasonably easy choice anyway.

[frictionlessO]

33. More flies with honey and all that.

Truly the only people any of us needs a weapon for tend to have a predisposed extremist streak accompanied by a self justified need to mitigate violence upon innocents (though innocent may be guilty in their reality) to further their own agendas...

Then again I could be wrong...

[Emperor_Norton_II]

36. That is a subject for another day...

...and one where my eventual rant will probably get me tombstoned.

But I digress...

[frictionlessO]

39. hmmmm, sad but ok... if you want to avoid a tombstone

try not to take your guns, rifles, knives to your fellow DU'ers. Generally speaking its bad form and all. Yet I digress as well, though my curiosity is piqued. After all, why wait?

[Emperor_Norton_II]

40. Once again, a story for another day.

[shireen]

28. Emperor

thanks, for a nice concise level-headed account.

There was a power outage last night so I missed the news spin. Caught a part of Countdown tho' ... sounded pretty doom & gloom for NASA. How did the other news outlets cover it?

After *how many?* launches, and they're worried about foam only now? It's a miracle we haven't lost more shuttles.

[Emperor_Norton_II]

31. Ist nicht.

There was a power outage last night so I missed the news spin. Caught a part of Countdown tho' ... sounded pretty doom & gloom for NASA. How did the other news outlets cover it?

Pretty much the same way, with the sensationalism slightly different for the network, as usual. Of course, NASA management did the dumbassed thing and announced the freeze on the second day of the freakin' mission, which did very little to make anybody feel better. If they'd waited until Discovery was back on the ground I imagine the reaction would've been a little less hysterical.

[pitohui]

29. poor vulture

nice round-up, i too believe the shuttle will be fine

grounding the fleet seems extreme but nasa is trying to take care

[Parche]

41. Awesome report

Now can you do the same thing to tell us why Cafta passed?

[Emperor_Norton_II]

43. Sorry, not my thing.

Space shuttles, I can do. Trade agreements, no so much.

[pa28]

42. Thanks for the informative post.

P.S. I wasn't aware the great Emperor Norton had a successor. I guess we're in presence of royalty here at DU!

[Chichiri]

44. Thanks for the great summary!

[Rex]

45. Thanks for the 411

This is why I love DU! Best place on the net for info for just about anything!

[Phoonzang]

46. Good Job with that post!

:thumbsup:

[Warren DeMontague]

47. It's well past time to find a better way of getting into space

We need to move beyond the shuttle.

[leftofthedial]

48. thank you for the information

excellent post.

too bad we won't be spending another billion-plus this year on sending a few people into orbit for the repuke military agenda

I was kind of looking forward to watching the launch on Fox on the TV down at the homeless shelter

[Ian David]

49. Excellent post! Thanks! Here's a dumb quesiton...

If it looks dangerous, can the shuttle land (or crash) itself un-manned, while the crew seeks refuge at the ISS until alternative transport is available?

For example, a good ol' reliable Soyuz capsule?

Or can they just park the shuttle in orbit (and return the crew via Soyuz) until the shuttle can be repaired?

And here's some crazy ideas:

If a shuttle is too damaged to safely re-enter, how about re-fueling it and retrofitting it to do one or more of the following tasks:

1) Keeping it in orbit permanently as a utility/rescue vehicle.

2) An un-manned robotic probe to explore the Moon, Mercury, Phobos, Deimos, Europa... anyplace without an atmosphere that might strip-off more tiles. There's always that Apothos asteroid we'd better start paying attention to.

3) Fill it with sensors and communications gear, park it near Saturn or Jupiter, and use it as a permanent observatory , and as a platform to relay messages between Earth and other long-distance spaceprobes.

4) Use it to ferry material from the moon to Earth orbit and back.

5) Fit it with an ion drive and a solar sail and send it to Alpha Centauri.

6) Put Bush and Rove in the cargo hold, and sell the ship to Hotblack Desiato.

[Emperor_Norton_II]

50. Repair options

(delayed because life is what happens when you make other plans)

If the shuttle turns out to be seriously damaged, there are a few repair options that they're planning to test anyway. If that won't work, the SOP in this situation would be to transfer the crew and as many consumables to ISS as possible, then bring the orbiter in over the Pacific unmanned. The shuttle can't land completely on automatic - there has to be somebody in the cockpit to push a button to lower the landing gear - so even if the damage was survivable Discovery would be dumped in the drink.

In that event, the station and shuttle crew would be waiting for the first available rescue mission, about 40 days before Atlantis could be prepped for launch. It wouldn't be luxury accomodations, but there's enough air and water onboard ISS plus stuff scavenged from the orbiter that it would be survivable.

Soyuz is considered more a last-resort option, not because they're unreliable, but because Energia is building them on a pay-as-you-go basis. So it's iffy that there'd be enough Soyuz handy at any one time to retrieve the crew.

[Ian David]

51. Thanks. It's good that they have that option, but why bother returning it

to Earth if it's just going to be destroyed anyway?

Why not keep it in space and use it for something?

[Emperor_Norton_II]

52. The shuttle really has a limited lifespan

None of its systems are designed for long-duration spaceflight. The safety margin is 30 days for the entire crew, and I've seen engineers speculate that they could possibly double that if they went into an Apollo 13-style super hibernation, but beyond that you just run out. And the orbiter wasn't designed to be resupplied on-orbit. Once the OMS fuel runs out, it's dead in the water and once the fuel cells dry up, it's dead period.

Deliberately scuttling the orbiter is considered the best option, since it gives NASA control over where it comes down. An uncontrolled reentry would mean it could fall just about anywhere; remember what happened to Skylab in '79.

[FogerRox]

56. What do you think of the X-38 scram jet?

scale the idea up to size- call it the Next GEneration shuttle?

Bu the way on Jan. 28, 1986 I had a birthday---- the worst one ever

[Emperor_Norton_II]

57. You mean the X-43?

X-38 is an entirely different animal, basically the first attempt at a CRV. It was cancelled not too long after it began drop tests.

As for the 43, it could work as a design, but scaling up the scramjet might be a bit difficult. Still a few bugs to work out of the system and all.

Personally, I'd dust off the DC-X and get that bad boy working again. SSTO, baby!

[FogerRox]

58. sorry X43-- DOH

DC-X wow hadnt thought of that for a while

Maybe a scaled up scram jet just as a a taxicab-- just for crews

Something else for the frieght, the Shuttle is more of a SUV, We need a car and a truck-- not one that trys to do both

[Emperor_Norton_II]

60. That's what heavy lifters are for

Delta 4 Heavy or the Atlas 5 would do the job. So would the Energia, if we had the factories, tooling and support facilities for it.

Still expendable, but we can't have everything all at once...

[Ian David]

68. Yeah, I remember I was in summer camp and we were hoping to see it

It hit near Australia, didn't it?

[Emperor_Norton_II]

69. Right on top of Australia, actually.

[queeg]

53. The Shuttle Fleet Today

Current Fleet
Discovery 31 flights
Atlantis 26 flights
Endeavor 19 flights

Lost
Columbia 28 flights
Challenger 10 flights

Test Units
Pathfinder
Enterprise

[Joe the Revelator]

54. What is the arrival date of the next generation shuttle?

Just how far away are we from that?

[Emperor_Norton_II]

55. Current delivery date is 2008

Of course, the OSP project is still seriously underfunded for something that's supposed to deliver a working spacecraft for testing in three years.

[FogerRox]

59. They rewired Apollo in less time then that after :THE FIRE"

[Emperor_Norton_II]

61. Different situation

Apollo was refitting a known quantity. Same with the shuttle after Challenger and recently.

OSP is building an entirely new vehicle from scratch.

[FogerRox]

62. & With Repubs building it, it will fly like a B-1b bomber

They will be lucky to have a static engine test in 2008

[Emperor_Norton_II]

63. The situation is not tied to any one political party, I fear.

[FogerRox]

64. Reagan built the B-1 and it freakin sucked

built 10 airframes then realized the gas tanks wouldnt do- too small

[Emperor_Norton_II]

65. Yes, but that's not the point.

The point is, as long as the space program in general is not a priority for the government, it will continue to languish. Doesn't matter if it's a Republican or Democrat in office; if they don't care, they won't fund. Clinton didn't care about NASA except as a way to make nice with the Russians. Our boy W sees it as a way to make a quick political buck, much like he sees everything else. The gaggle of candidates we had last year made the appropriate noises but wouldn't sign off on a funding authorization.

Gore... ah, now Al I could see taking a shine to NASA. His Triana project was kind of silly, but it had immense potential in its symbolic value. Kind of a pity that it was cancelled, though considering it was supposed to go up on STS-107 maybe it was for the best.

[FogerRox]

66. just like Lincolns land grant to the railraods

let the corporations go get an asteriod FE based, or get some regolith on Luna

Rail to the stars if you will

And and I dont see this generation of repubs spending money on space in a fiscally prudent manner.

[Catchawave]

70. Thank you so much.....

especially for putting it so gently in "lay terms" so I can understand :0

[Emperor_Norton_II]

71. De nada

Keeps things in perspective, after all.

[CantGetFooledAgain]

73. Excellent post. Thank you! (nt)

[Emperor_Norton_II]

74. Kicking it back to the top.

:kick:

ABC News is reporting that there was a strike to the wings, but not that significant damage was seen:

NASA analysts suspect at least one piece of foam insulation did in fact hit the wing of the space shuttle Discovery as it took off on Tuesday, ABC News has learned.

Engineers had believed that the foam did not strike Discovery, but new analysis has led them to suspect at least one small piece of foam did hit the shuttle's wing, leaving what engineers described as a scuff mark.

Video taken of Discovery's liftoff on Tuesday showed a piece of foam broke away from the fuel tank but then fell clear of the craft without striking it. Foam debris damaged the tiles of the shuttle Columbia on its ill-fated final journey in 2003.

NASA officials have scoured Discovery's tiles over the past two days to see if its thermal tiles were damaged on launch.

"The initial report was that it looks extremely good and we don't have anything to worry about on Discovery," flight operations manager John Shannon said today. Officials cautioned that they had not yet finished their inspections.

For the record folks, don't start writing the obituaries before something happens.

[Bill Bored]

75. And here I thought this was going to be a conspiracy theory!

Like they will be having secret launches to put up missile defense stuff without telling us. Minor damage to the external tank and ostensibly "grounding" the orbiters would be a nice cover story, wouldn't it? I'd imagine the launches would be detectable by other national technical means though, unless they had a stealthy way of doing them.

Thanks for the update!

[Emperor_Norton_II]

76. I wish. A conspiracy theory would have better legs...

People would be speculating on the horrible things about to happen and how to pin the blame all on Bush... it'd be up to 200 posts and running like it was on fire.

But nooo, I had to be all boring and post the facts and shit. ;)

[crispini]

77. Great post!

Thanks!

[Blue-Jay]

78. *applauds*

[myrna minx]

79. Thank you so much for this post.

I was concerned for the crew, but now I feel more assured that they will return safely. :applause:

[Emperor_Norton_II]

80. kick & an UPDATE

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/29/science/space/29shuttle.html?hp&ex=1122609600&en=a695627ea473d8f9&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Back on Earth, hundreds of engineers scrutinized startlingly clear pictures of the shuttle's delicate protective tiles to see whether they had sustained the kind of liftoff damage that would make it unsafe to come home.

The shuttle Discovery carried out an unprecedented back-flip to allow the crew members to photograph the shuttle's heat shield.

So far, the engineers said, they saw nothing that would threaten a safe return, though analysis is not yet complete.

New impact sensors on the leading edges of the shuttle's wings, installed in the wake of the 2003 Columbia disaster, indicate that there were 11 possible debris strikes on the edges. But inspection of the edges showed no damage greater than a scuff, NASA officials said, and nothing that at first blush constituted a threat.

"This was a great day in space," said N. Wayne Hale, the deputy manager of the shuttle program.

And for those interested, a a few pictures of Discovery's nose as seen from ISS:





Watch this space for further developments.

[AnarchoFreeThinker]

81. when are we going to go to Mars and pour a few more billion

of dark $$$$$ into weapons development in case the Martians won't let us have their oil? Just wondering, because I love scientific inquiry.