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Columbia Coverage
ke4roh writes "Space.com offers a list of questions and answers about the events and hardware surrounding Columbia's destruction Saturday. They address suspected causes, foam, tile, and some of the alternatives had NASA known the ship would not be able to re-enter the atmosphere." viewstyle writes "PC Magazine has a pack of stuff put together on the space shuttle accident, as they recognized the fact that the space program inspired a lot of tech people in general. What's pretty cool is the section written by a guy there who worked on the computer components in the shuttle." And naturally, the idea of a space elevator is back in vogue again.
I've been hearing a lot about the 30 seconds of telemetry that was too weak for the computers to display during the shuttle break-up but that is now being analyzed from backups. Does anybody have any more information on what this data?
As I understand it, the last 'good readings' were full-scale low or high on a lot of the temperature sensors, which to me would indicate sensor failure. Several of these sensors reported such values before communication was lost. This kind of makes me wonder what benefit there would be in examining whatever else came back after those failures--I can't imagine the data would be particularly accurate, though there may be some valuable information. Can anybody elaborate?
Karma: Excellent Birds (mostly as a result of listening to Laurie Anderson)
I couldn't agree more, which is surprising since I usually don't agree with anything he says. But I really believe that changing NASA's focus might be the ideal solution to the public's (read: media's) boredom with our space program.
Very good.
Also, broken telemetry readings and strength of signal can be used to determine the attitude (read : orientation, not height) of the shuttle since transmitters are usually directional.
The attitude data of the shuttle at its final seconds would be the most useful information. For example, you can use it to determine how the shuttle begin to tumble out of standard flight reentry modes.
Mode (3) smart-aleck mode. Press * to return to main menu.
As early as the day after Columbia was lost, we are starting to see reports of management decisions that affected safelty, design, and ignored problems what were spookily predicted when it came to the foam. Sure, lots of letters might cross managements desk in regards to shuttle problems. But it's the fucking shuttle, you check them ALL or you just don't DO the shuttle. Suddenly the pointy haired boss in Dilbert strips isn't so funny, knowing how accurate he is to real managers in the real world.
In the past four years as a computer programmer (doing other shit now, self employed, NO management to harrass or to blame) I've gotten to enjoy the view as in each and every company I worked at, managers were the cause of almost every problem that happened with the products. To all the managers reading this: goto www.dilbert.com and check to make sure you are not an idiot leading a team of people who know a lot more than you. THINK. LISTEN. THINK MORE. TRY TO DO SOME FUCKING GOOD since you do the "planing of the work" and not the actual "work". Make the best of your time in your leather chear and wall-side office, and LEAD. Watch Braveheart, get motivated!
Well ... as of this morning NASA is focusing on the foam hit as being the most likely cause, so I don't think red herring status is appropriate.
It turns out the shuttle was on the pad during drenching rainstorms and there's (NASA) speculation that ice may've built up. Given that the piece of foam that broke off was near the strut that attaches the shuttle proper to the external fuel tank, with the strut surrounded by foam, it's possible that water could've accumulated there. Which would've frozen once the tank was filled with LOX and liquid hydrogen.
If the chunk that fell off contained a lot of ice it would've been a lot heavier than foam alone. And the engineering analysis that was done apparently only looked at the case where the foam was foam alone.
This is all in today's NYT and my local paper (which goes to bed later than our edition of the Times as I'm on the West Coast) and all comes straight from NASA.