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Columbia Accident Board Preliminary Recommendations
fwc writes "The Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) has released some preliminary recommendations to NASA - To do a better job at inspecting the leading edge of the shuttle's wings, and also to ensure that pictures of the orbiter are taken while in orbit. More recommendations are to follow in the full report which is expected in June. More detailed information on the recommendations are at space.com and spaceflightnow.com. NASA Administrator O'Keefe seems optimistic that they will be able to return the shuttle fleet to flight by the end of the year since there has been no show-stopping problems which have been discovered during the investigation."
Be more careful! As if NASA wasn't already careful.
I mean, they go over it with a fine-toothed comb before they launch, and then a couple of weeks later they just say "OK, everybody buckle in, we're heading home". Sheesh, it takes more than that to fly a private plane, doesn't it? You do a pre-flight check, you fly, you land, then you do another pre-flight before you fly home again. Is that so hard a concept to apply here?
How come they don't have some tethered drone camera dingus that does an inch-by-inch surveilance of the important bits while they're still in orbit? Why bother with all the "well, if we use a 3-foot-long-telephoto-spy-lens..." crap?
Heck, here's another opportunity for Canada to come to the rescue, just add another attachment on to the big shuttle bay crane arm.
Well no, other than the strong suspicion that a chunk of the craft can fall off during lift-off and fatally damage the vehicle...
That and the rather conspicuous lack of (1) shuttle. Are they planning to build another, or just spread out launches for the reduced rotation?
Maybe Richard Branson can dig one up...
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
when the shuttle launched, a piece of debris broke off and hit the wing. Back then they said it didn't matter, then the shuttle exploded on re-entry. Now, months and months of 'careful study' they find that the wing had been damaged. No sh*t... what a useless exercise. And the recommendation: study the shuttle more carefully! Ummm. yeah, how much are they being paid for this?
-Larry Niven
Display some adaptability.
I sure am glad we're spending 50 million dollars to find out why an old, damaged spacecraft exploded, killing several people who knew what they were doing, and only 9 million to find out how our government's inability to communicate with itself allowed 9/11 to happen. Our government sure does have its priorities in order.
*This page intentionally left pointless*
They don't need to check the wings better, they need to be 'on their feet' when there is and anomoly during lunch, and respond intelligently.
love is just extroverted narcissism
The space shuttles are man made vehicles designed to take people into space! There are going to be inherent risks with such undertakings, but this is the nature of space exploration. Time will provide safer alternatives, but for now 1/50 isn't bad.
The astronauts know these risks too, and they willingly assume them.
PS: The Internet Explorer comment is unnecessary.
Curb CO2 emissions: Kill yourself today!
... and that is the space shuttle program itself. Too many variables, too inefficient and too easy to break. What is really needed is a fundamental rethinking of the space program. The shuttle is still useful as a "space truck", perhaps. But to use it to just jet people into space for scientific experiments is a huge waste of resources. They need something smaller, lighter, safer, and easier to maintain. NASA is one major accident away from getting its program sacked completely. The shuttle it a ticking time bomb.
There is inherent risk in space flight
And it's made much greater by operating a vehicle with razor-thin margins. Take a look at this amazing story about the reentry of Soyuz 5. One of the things that struck me was how robust soviet space hardware is. The shuttle, by comparison, is extremely fragile. It couldn't possibly take one percent of the punishment that Volynov's capsule took.
And yet Boris Volynov is alive to tell the story.
Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael Anderson, David Brown, Kalpana Chawla, Laurel Blair and Ilan Ramon are not.
The Russian space program had its share of lethal accidents - but it also had several major accidents where the crew survived. With the shuttle the abort modes are mostly theoretical. In practice any serious accident means loss of the entire crew.
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
Both Challenger nor Columbia were caused by human error. In Challenger's case, the politicians/managers made the decision to go despite warnings from the engineers. In Columbia's case, they had the opportunity to take pictures of the shuttle in orbit, per suggestions by the engineers, but decided not to do so. (What they could have done to save the crew is a separate topic.)
No, it's not a separate topic, especially since you use the lack of cameras as a "cause" of the accident. People need to use their heads before making statements like this. What, exactly, would have taking pictures of the shuttle actually accomplished in this case? How was not taking pictures in any way contributory to the accident? The recommendation is for *future* space flights - pictures of Columbia while in space would have accomplished nothing but satisfying the morbid curiosity of people like you after the fact.
If there was damage to the leading edge of the wing from launch, Columbia was doomed, plain and simple. I don't see how having pictures confirming that ahead of time is going to make anybody feel any better about it. Great, so now the astronauts know they're going to die. How fun for them and for us. It would have been like Apollo 13 all over again, only this time without the happy ending.
It's been firmly established that there was no way to save these astronauts once they were up there. They did not have enough fuel to reach the ISS. There was not enough time to rush another shuttle up to rescue them before their food and water ran out - not even ignoring all safety rules and risking two accidents for the price of one.
Cameras may help troubleshoot and solve problems on future shuttle flights. Eventually, it will likely seem ridiculous that we don't now have exterior cameras covering all surfaces of our spacecraft, and the ability to film them from satellites as well. But on this particular flight, there is nothing anybody could have done to save these astronauts once they were up there, camera or no camera. The only helpful thing having pictures would have done would be in helping determine the cause of the accident afterwards - but we know there was a breach in the wing without them, so even that point is moot.
Safer space flight IS possible (remember when flying was dangerous?). Yes, the challenges are greater, but none of them are beyond our knowledge of physics or engineering. Building robust, safe, efficient spacecraft has been possible 20+ years ago. Building robust, safe, efficient reuseable spacecraft wasn't 20 years ago, but we may be getting close now.
EnkiduEOT
There is no trap so deadly as the trap you set for yourself
-Raymond Chandler, The Long Goodbye
I can't help but feel that the shuttle program, with all its warts, is still vital and needs to continue.
I strongly dis-agree. the SPACE program is still vital and needs to continue but the horribly outdated Shuttle program needs to be given an end of life that is in the near future and rapidly design a new more capable and efficient system to replace it with.
I dont know about you but the space programs in both major countries is pretty much a joke. We are flying in a 1982 Reliant K car while the russians ar still flying in their 1957 studebaker.
we have the technology right now for several updated and higher performance launch systems that will be a good basis for getting to Mars and the rest of the inner solar system... a place where we should have been over 10 years ago. Its the idiots and morons we keep voting into office that can't pull their heads out of their arses or the major corperations arses long enough to act like the leaders they are supposed to be.
Dont get me wrong, the shuttle engineers are an amazing crew to keep that old thing flying and somewhat updated, and the same goes for the Soyuz engineers... amazing men doing fricking amazing things with a ball of twine and a roll of duct-tape.
As those are the only approved materials that congress let's nasa use anymore.
Maybe in my children's lifetime we will get a government here in the US that has enough leadership and balls to actually get us there... but I highly doubt it. The chineese will get there first.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
The Apollo team did have his attitude. Read up on the lightning strike during the launch of Apollo 12 and the descision to go ahead with the mission. There was a pretty good chance that the parachute pyros had been fried by the lightning, but there was no way to inspect them, and no way to fix them even if they were fried. There also was no spacecraft that could be sent up for a rescue mission before 12 would have run out of supplies. Mission Control decided to send them on to the Moon, since they'd be just as dead if they brought them back immediately.
You can only drink 30 or 40 glasses of beer a day, no matter how rich you are.
-- Colonel Adolphus Busch
Unfortunately this is virtually impossible. Every Space shuttle is almost completely taken apart, and then reassembled, and lots of parts are replaced, EVERY time it goes on a mission (there is a reason why it costs between 50-500 mil to send the shuttle up there ONCE). What you are suggesting is basically taking a second shuttle with them, but then with all the extra load of extra parts, the shuttle wouldn't even lift off. It's simply not possible. Most of these repairs could under no circumstances be performed in space, or while the craft is in use.
The real idea is, that if you find something bad enough that you doubt the craft would make it back safely, send up another spaceshuttle to dock with it, or have the space shuttle dock at the space station and unload it's crew, or have a Soyuz or two pick up the crew. There are options to get the crew home safely even if we think the craft won't make it. But repairing a space craft with billions of highly specialized parts in space? Not any time soon...
Reinard
Russia is flying a 1957 Beetle.
And China is starting a program based on the Mexican version of the 1975 SuperBeetle.
If anyone is concerned that this represents an apparent Devolution of humanity's capacity to invent, and innovate -
Why not read a classic science fiction book by Issac Asimov, called Foundation. It's actually a trilogy, but it's about this very subject.
The people who are in power today have command of JUST the technology they need in order to maintain their hegemony. Any more is superfluous. The only thing that matters is political power. The technology that created this power has served it's purpose, and now the only technology necessary is that which maintains that power.
Anyone who tells you any different is trying to sell you something.
Notice how the development of new technology which might "shake the tree" is gradually becoming legally and economically prohibited. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.