Slashdot Mirror
NASA Prepares for Space Rescues
wallstreetprodigy23 copies and pastes "Space shuttle commander Steve Lindsey is preparing for a mission he hopes will never launch: the rescue of other astronauts in orbit. If a crisis arises during shuttle Discovery's planned return to flight in May, Lindsey and a crew of three could be called upon to lift off aboard sister ship Atlantis on an emergency mission that would be the first in the history of human space exploration. Rescue flights were hotly debated at NASA after shuttle Columbia broke up in the skies above Texas two years ago this Tuesday. Questions arose about whether Columbia's seven astronauts could have been saved. Because of the accident, NASA will have a backup shuttle and rescue crew ready for at least the next two flights in case another ship suffers damage similar to what brought down Columbia."
If Columbia is used as an example, shouldn't NASA be looking at policies that allow them to delay a launch and/or return, and conduct a thorough inspection of the craft? From what I have read (from the transcripts), it was too late for Columbia to do anything by the time they realized something was wrong. Catching Genesis mid-air with a helicopter didn't work.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
be good practice for them and the whole world benefits at the same time
all for less than the price of a months war in Iraq
So, they assume that somehow troubles in space can be solved with a rescue mission. This is good. I think people is more incline to think that space troubles are disastrous.
Pumbaa! I don't wonder; I know.
Thunderbirds are GO!
I'm not a rocket scientist, so let me make sure I have this right:
1) Build space station.
2) Send astronauts to space station.
3) A few years later, start brainstorming a rescue plan.
- remove the shuttle on board thrusters and just use stapons
- with the weight saved put an ejectable cockpit / escape pod like the F111 or stick a small one in the cargo bay - there should be room.
> ...because of the accident, NASA will have a
> backup shuttle and rescue crew ready for at
> least the next two flights in case another ship
> suffers damage similar to what brought down
> Columbia."
It took a hundred flights for the Columbia failure mode to occur. There has been no other flight where an in-flight emergency occured such that rescue might be considered.
Bearing this in mind, what's the point in having a rescue shuttle ready for the next two flights only?
Always having a rescue shuttle available would be useful, but which probably isn't practical, since there are now only three Shuttles.
It seems to me there is a lack of proper vision in the space programme.
We have manned spaceflight, but being used in a way where unmmaned spaceflight could be perfectly well used instead (probably at lower cost, and certainly with zero risk to human life).
Manned spaceflight *is* vital, but not for Shuttle flights! manned spaceflight is necessary to establish colonies on other moons and planets.
Humans will not really start colonizing other worlds, though, until the Space Elevator is built; then it will become practical.
I expect this to occur within my lifetime, assuming we don't destroy the planet first.
--
Toby
If a crisis arises during shuttle Discovery's planned return to flight in May, Lindsey and a crew of three could be called upon to lift off aboard sister ship Atlantis on an emergency mission that would be the first in the history of human space exploration.
Wouldn't they have to check and double check the rescue shuttle, looking for problems which caused mayday? If searching and fixing the malfunctions in the rescue shuttle takes even just a few days, wouldn't this rescue be too late?
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
So, if the Atlantis were launched for such a rescue mission, how would it get back without a "zed-pee-em"?
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
+1 Informative.
Hmm, I wonder if this system could also be used to rescue Russian, Chinese or even Europeran astronauts in orbit in the future, and if NASA would use it for this. This is surely the kind of thing that would be an ideal colabriative mission beteen nations.
+1 WTF.
Woudn't it make more sense (humanly and logically, not necessarily financially) to always have a backup shuttle ready? Sure as hell, there won't be a screwup so soon after restarting flights; NASA won't allow anything to get off the ground this early with any problems at all; it would look bad for PR. But later, like in a few years, they'll have slacked up, and something could go wrong. Hopefully, they'll have a backup flight ready to go if/when that happens.
Look at the size of the original orbital capsules. Excape capsules could be created that take up 1/2 the space, could survive re-entry, and easily fit within the cargo area. Wouldn't that be much cheaper than a sister shuttle at the ready?
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
+1 Troll of the day
This may be the precursor to a major mission-critical paradigm shift for global players and local merkets alike and could be leveraged by off-shoring and out-sourcing the stockholder-value to old people in Korea.
Note: In Nagasaki, they like bukakke.
I had a response to this but there is so much wrong with ur post from off topic to "labourer" to "Preventive" I am just going to say ur a moron without a clue.
No, not unless rescuers were launched by a full-speed ICBM the very instant the shuttle broke up. Unless Houston can immediately get news of a wing break, this is a non-starter. Space travel is an inherently dangerous business--going into harsh atmospheres (if any atmosphere at all), lack of gravity and air pressure to keep you in shape, old and tough-to-maintain equipment in space shuttles, etc; I'm shocked there's any debate.
If I was an astronaut I'd be thinking about my two choices during any mission:
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
The Shuttle has had its day. Stop sinking so many dollars into this antiquated, fragile, expensive money pit and design and build a space transportation system that belongs to this century, not the last.
No mod points, no meta-moderating/Firehose/all the other free work Slashdot wants me to do.
So, let me get this right. If, by some chance, the horribly overcomplicated shuttle breaks in orbit, we'll launch another horribly overcomplicated shuttle that *probably* has the same design flawas the first?
This is a perfect example of people trying to solve a problem that does not exist.
Since its introduction, two shuttles have been lost. That's about 15 years of operation per accident. I'd take thoes odds any day. But one fucking shuttle blows up because of a freak accident and then we have to spend millions of dollars to ensure the sound-byte-informed public that it won't happen agian.
It's just like that fucking terrorism thingy. We send billions on crap while more USians died on the roads in Sep 2001 ever died in terrorist attacks.
Pull your fucking heads out and spend the money where you can actually see some return.
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
Your premise seems to be that bureaucracies should act rationally. They Do Not.
Public Choice Theory demonstrates that what is "rational" to a government bureaucrat is not "rational" under the logical framework of private enterprise or individual action. The motivations are all messed up, as viewed from the outside.
The pioneers of space were expendable, to the bureaucratic mind, because creating a method of "rescue" would cost more than training new recruits and weathering the bad publicity.
The rocket scientists themselves were employed to do a job, and if they didn't like it they could seek employment elsewhere.
Bob-
The Ludwig von Mises Institute. The reasoning individuals economics
Than just sending up a rescue ship? I mean, lets say at worse theres some catastrophic disaster that causes Ship A to be a total loss. How does Ship B ferry the rest home? Are the shuttles built and designed to hold and land with two crews? You create the potential for either overweight shuttles on re-entry, or you could cause loss of human life if they get bumped around enough on landing/re-entry. An okay idea, but I think wed be better off with solutions that either involve-
A- An escape module
B- A way to repair the shuttle while in space
-thewldisntenuff
My MythTV HowTo
But who is going to rescue the people on the rescue-mission?
bash$
Recommendation One:
Recommendation Two:
Recommendation Three:
Recommendation Four:
If they implement everything as recommended there is no need for a rescue plan and I doubt such a plan would actually work, it seems more like a publicity stunt to reassure the masses.
The whole thing was an overengineered government boondoggle. It didn't make sense then, and doesn't make sense now, while looking at it logically.
The motivations of the various parties are clear enough.
-NASA was politicking, they didn't want to have a situation like Apollo where the last few flights were eliminated because of changing conditions and or national boredom. A reusable craft almost demands use. They also wanted to create a consistent work environment rather than running a constant R&D shop. Government employees are not good at R&D, in general. Most R&D establishments in the military, for instance, morph into bureaucratic wastes of money over time due to the fact that government oversight doesn't lend itself to dynamic activity. If the unique, dynamic overseers of the project, those exceptional people who have drive and ambition within government, leave their posts - the project stagnates. NASA is no exception.
-The pilots wanted something aircraft-like to fly, damn the fact that it's not a useful shape for a spacecraft. That was the design spec, and safety was compromised to meet it.
-The politicians were throwing a bone to NASA and appropriated the funds based on the successful lunar missions. Oversight on this was near-nil, except for the dollar figure which was chopped in half, exacerbating the problem.
So they seized on an Air Force requirement regarding the capability to return payload from orbit, which ultimately has been used very infrequently, and used that as a justification to achieve all their other disparate goals.
They promised all kinds of capabilities such as quick turnaround which are bogus in reality. They promised cheaper per-flight costs. They promised greater safety. A lot was promised that never materialized.
Note that none of the real justifications for a reusable, aircraft shaped spacecraft had anything to do with science, advancing human exploration, or efficiency. Pretty much tells the whole story, no?
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Surely Apollo 13 shows your dichotomy to be false.
I bet that NASA would be exponentially less expensive and more effective if they were willing to have the astronauts assume the same risk as your average NASCAR driver. It's extremely safe for what they're doing (whipping around at 200 mph, which is no small feat) and everybody involved knows the risks and still willingly participates.
The Shuttle's return mode is as an Aircraft (glider) and as such it needs to keep its Centre of Gravity within acceptable limits.
Just adding 7 persons to the front-end of the shuttle would undoubtedly shift the C of G of an unladen craft quite a way forward. Whether this would go beyond the C of G limits I cannot say. The only obvious solution to the C of G problem would be pumping liquid stores and / or Hydrazine aft.
However, I do not believe they are intending to tackle this problem. My guess is that the first launches after return to service may only have crews of three or four, thus enabling a 'rescue' flight with a crew of three to come back with a total complement of seven.
The other issue with bringing back more than seven would be adequate seating to prevent the inevitable injuries which could occur during re-entry for an un-restrained person.
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
I'am quite sure I have read something long ago that there is in fact an agreement between the various space agencies in the world that if a crew is in danger, any agency with an available spacecraft will make a rescue attempt. I might be wrong. But it would make alot more sense to have an inter-agency cooperation regarding space rescue then for each agency to have backup spacecrafts and crews ready at all time.
Another rescue shuttle prepared in case the rescue shuttle needs rescuing.
The main things to consider about this whole rescue shuttle thing..
1) That an emergency is spotted in time to allow for a stationary orbit to allow for docking.
2) That they have determined the cause of said emergency and it is a low probability of occurring to the rescue shuttle.
3) That the emergency occurs during the 2 least stressful phases of operation (launch and on-orbit) of the three phases of flight.
Probably the most important is the second caveat. Do you launch another Shuttle if you don't know if there is a systemic problem? Do you launch if it is low probability? Consider the foam impact issue. Foam impacts were more the norm than the exception. It's just none had led to vehicle loss before. What would the judgement call be in that situation? Launch now that you now know that the impacts can cause a loss of shuttle? To be honest, I am not sure that they would have launched a shuttle to rescue Columbia under the conditions at that time, even had they known fully in advance it would mean the loss of the shuttle and crew. At that point, many of the shuttle launches had been hit by foam, so the odds were the rescue one would be also and there was a demonstrated 1% loss rate related to foam impacts. They probably would have, but the possibility is there that a systemic problem could cause the loss of two crews and shuttles.
Why not just slow down a bit before entering the atmosphere? I mean the shuttle is going thousands of mph and they come down red hot and like a bat out of hell. Why not try to have more fuel onboard and slow down more so you don't need as much protection against the heat. If you slowed down to the Earth's rotation you could just fall into the atmosphere with no heat, like the X prize contestants did. Maybe just scrub off some speed like they do now only do it longer.
Most of the problems with the shuttle can be traced back to Nixon, he wouldn't fund it unless it could be used for launching and retrieving military satellites. NASA wanted a completely different design, and thought that the current shuttle would be insane, cost less in the short term but vastly more in the long term. Nixon didn't care about long term costs, because he wouldn't be in office anymore.
Not a useful shape? They have to steer and slow down in the atmosphere you know. Or maybe you thought they landed at 10000 miles an hour?
Actually one of the main reasons for it being aircraft shaped was that the Military wanted a craft that could return classified payloads not jsut to earth, but directly to a US territory, instead of splashing down in an ocean where it could potentially be stolen by a passing enemy ship or submarine. Hence the requirement for it to be able to glide and come into a controlled landing.
Couldn't this be solved by create a sealed pod with additional seating that could be placed in the cargo hold of the Shuttle?
This could also be designed to remove the balance problem.
NASA employees have been flying first class for far too long. It's about time some of them got to try steerage.
The next two flights will be the most triple checked in Shuttle history as all eyeballs will be on NASA. It is unlikely that anything will go wrong on those flights. It's the 10th or so flight and beyond when NASA is again crunched for time and money when it gets extra dangerous. People will ignore and cover up things because they don't want to be the cause of a holdup.
Shuttle should never fly again and the money better spent on newer and simpler methods of getting man from ground to orbit. The shuttle's bad design make more accidents very likely.
Slashdot, home of supporters of free software, free music, and free speech.Except for Moderators that disagree with you.
2 down, 3 to go
My money is on Endeavour
If you find this post offensive, don't read it! THINK ABOUT YOUR BREATHING! I am what I am because of how apes behave.
Exactly where do you draw the line when it comes to the cost of saving a handful of high-profile people? (Astronauts.)
Are 7 so-so scientists really worth the tens of millions of dollars needed to launch a rescue mission?
The Soviets solved this with Soyuz. I'm sure we could have arrived at a different solution.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Aww, too late...
This is one of these "Soviet Russia" satellites, isn't it
"She's furniture with a pulse"
That's exactly the problem. Non-airplane shaped craft are much easier to slow down and land, without all the complicated flight paths and associated steering requirements.
DNA just wants to be free...
Soyuz cant return a payload to earth... Plus it impacts at quite a rate into the ground, im pretty sure I read somewhere that thats one of the reasons Soyuz hasnt ever been adapted to reusable status, the stress placed on the frame. A glider would bring a payload back to earth nice and gentley.
Find me another manned spacecraft that has an aircraft shape. Buran's only flights were unmanned.
Thank you for permitting my demonstration of your sophistry.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
"Just launch the five shuttles" - "Three shuttles, sir!" - "Right, three shuttles..."
I'm more curious about how many people on the rescue team have read The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint?
(If you haven't already, go grab a copy. It explains how PowerPoint killed the Columbia astronauts, and if that doesn't drive the message home, I don't know what will...)
[o]_O
I'm right there with you blaming Nixon initially, but there were many chances to alter the program - whether it was Ford, Carter or Reagan - they all had opportunities to rationalize the program.
The fact that none of them did gives each a measure of culpability, or more specifically makes their staffs culpable. Each had a political appointee at NASA who could have done something about it.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
If the probability of failure is so high that the first mission fails, isnt it also very probable that the second shuttle will suffer the same failure? Would they just be killing 14 astronauts instead of 7?
At the end of the day these shuttles are really old - isnt it time to say goodbye to them & cut the loses? Its a bit like an old car that you have to keep spending more & more to get through the MOT - its better to get rid of it & save the money for a better car..
"You lied to me! There is a Swansea!"
The Columbia Accident Investigation Report listed one permutation of a rescue mission that could have been launched to save Columbia, if anyone had realized the true severity of the damage to her wing. According to the report, a second shuttle (I believe it was Endeavour, but it's been a while since I read the report) could have been rolled out and launched in a matter of days, skipping the normal three-month pre-launch safety checklist.
The second shuttle could have rendezvoused with Columbia and brought to station-keeping directly below her, such that the two shuttles' cargo bays were facing each other (Columbia would have been orbiting upside-down and backward relative to the ground, as is standard). Columbia's crew could then have transferred to the rescue shuttle via tether.
All of this could have been done inside the week-long window before Columbia's consumables were exhausted; after the rescue, Columbia would have been de-orbited into the ocean.
One of the things that will be mandatory on all remaining shuttle launches will be for all shuttles to be able to rendezvous and dock with the ISS, in the event something like this happens again. This was not an option for Columbia, for a couple of reasons--she was unable to boost to the ISS's altitude, and she lacked the correct docking mechanism to couple with the ISS.
Even if tile damage isn't observed on the first few flights, the underlying problem -- the great fragility of the leading edges -- remains, and we can't even estimate well how bad the risk is until at least the first rescue mission is flown - i.e. for something like another hundred missions. (I know, there are a priori ways to assess risk, but given the shenanigans the manned program management is known to pull, do you trust their a priori figures? Didn't think so...)
How about SpaceShipOne? Looks like an aircraft to me.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
Find me another spaceship that can brink sattellites back down to earth from orbit.
Buran wasn't the same shape as the shuttle because the russians stole the plans, its because they looked at the problem (reusable spaceplane) and realised the shuttle's shape is the most practical design.
I've always thought that humans and cargo should launch using seperate vehicles. Big dumb boosters for cargo and small tough protected vehicles for humans. Make the human vehicle reasonable aerodynamic for atmospheric flight reasons and simple to launch. Air launch possibly? We know a lot about making small tough vehicles (war planes) and we know a lot about air launch (SpaceShip 1, X-15 etc). I was taught to never put all my items in one basket. It works in computer science, why not at NASA?
Are they going to return to casual complacency that quickly?
"How about SpaceShipOne? Looks like an aircraft to me."
Why didn't NASA start contracting out to their shuttle missions to Scalar Composites as soon as they won the X-Prize? Oh yeah, I forgot, SpaceShipOne isn't capable of reaching orbit. To put it very simply, it goes up real high, and then falls down, just like my model rockets did when I was a kid, except on a $20 million dollar scale.
What Rutan and Scaled Composites did was indeed incredible, but they're no where close to building an orbiter.
Aero
Please stop hurting America -- Jon Stewart
Doesn't matter how you twist it, re-entry is going to be exposed to a minimum force level of 4 to 6 g. doesn't matter if its a Soyuz or a Shuttle. An apollo capsule would be up around 9 (similar to a soyuz operating in failsafe mode on a pure ballistic trajectory). If payload surviveability is your point of measurement, what difference does a soft landing make, all that really matters is that landing impact is less than the maximum aerodynamic forces during the descent. That is basically the parameter on which they designed the parachute sizes for a Soyuz.
Then, when we do the reality check, if you haven't kept up with the news, Columbia burned up on re-entry. One of the recommendations after that, was to reduce orbiter mass for re-entry. There wont be any more big payloads coming back from space aboard the shuttle.
Now that Russia and the U.S. are sometime partners in space exploration instead of bitter rivals, and each country is actually capable of launching rescue missions on fairly short notice (i.e. we usually have functional vehicles on hand), I'd hope that NASA and the RKA are also including each other in their contingency planning. (To say nothing of the several other countries/companies capable of getting craft and/or equipment up to orbital altitudes.) Because after a craft is damaged is not the time to start asking around to see if anybody might have anything they might be able to do to help.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Come on, they had a pretty good design for a single-person re-entry vehicle that weighed 215kg in the 60's. What could they do with the materials we have now?
Of course, I wouldn't want to be the astronaut that has to manually orient his return vehicle for reentry by pointing a handheld gas gun in the direction of travel..... but if I had no other choice, I'd probably spend 5 minutes thumbing through the manual and leap on in. Mind you, a ballistic reentry would pull 8 or so G's.
Hell, another 15 years and they'll probably make an extreme sport out of it.
You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.
You didn't ask for an orbiter, you asked for a spacecraft. SpaceShipOne is a spacecraft.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
There are already rescue systems designed and could be easily done for the cheap!!! and not risk other astronauts lifes in the process. Such as the Moose http://www.friends-partners.ru/partners/mwade/craf t/moose.htm
f tfam/rescue.htm
has several examples of already researched rescue pods/vehicles/modules and long term "lifeboats".
The moose is basically an EVA suit inside a plastic back with heatsheilding on the outside of the bag and foam on the inside. Testing showed that it would work as a single person escape pod. GE did all the testing on it in the early 60s.
Again I ask..
Why reinvent the wheel?
Btw.. THat same website going back one step http://www.friends-partners.ru/partners/mwade/cra
You would be correct except for one small detail: the shuttle has been limited to exactly one orbit for all future missions: ISS. If the mission isn't ISS it doesn't go. So there is no need to worry about changing orbits, or even catching up to the shuttle on some future mission. You just need to stay right next to ISS and you can rescue the shuttle at anytime.
Mind that because ISS is always there you don't really need the ability to get crew home! What you need it the ability to get supplies to ISS in an emergency. 7 astronauts eat more than the 3 ISS can support now. One also presumes that keeping the ISS in the stupid orbit they placed it in also requires more fuel with a shuttle attached. (though I think it would be a good idea to attach all the shuttles to ISS as a disposal method)
If the shuttle cannot reach ISS, no other rescue will work either. (Maybe having an escape capsule in the shuttle, but that wouldn't have saved Challenger)
Yes and no. Yes, all current re-entries are hard. It doesn't have to be. You can re-enter with much less g if you are willing to expend a lot of fuel maintaining altitude while going less than orbit speeds.
Currently the only way we could do that is to send lots of fuel up into orbit separately, and then after it is in place launch the mission, and re-fuel in orbit.
In short, it is not practical, but it can be done if we must.
Go take a poll of the astronaut corps, as well as the cosmonauts and other travelers. Betcha real money that the overwhelming majority would take a flight to orbit (or beyond) if they had to strap a set of solids to their asses and breathe through SCUBA gear. I sure as hell would.
And if they're not willing, what the hell are they doing in that line of work? Space flight is risky, and we have lost good people, and will lose more. That will never end, even if when we can cruise the galaxies. Shit will still happen.
Get over it.
Best,
Mal the Elder
The shuttle is a dead end, and everyone knows it. They are too expensive to run, too expensive to replace (with other shuttles) and too expensive PR wise to just scrap. So, you send one up, and it "experiences a malfunction". You send up the rescue shuttle, and rescue the brave astronauts. The "doomed" shuttle is set to burn up over the Pacific (with the appropriate Taco Bell endorsements). Everyone returns safely in the rescue shuttle.
Despite the heroic rescue there is a huge public outcry about shuttle safety. Suddenly, supporting clunky 30 year old designs is a political liability. The public, ever eager for vicarious space travel, calls for a newer, safer, cheaper alternative... especially if it leads to Mars. Voila, the perfect atmosphere to redesign the entire space program.
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
"Ya canna change tha laws of physics Jim..." :-)
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I am sure some of the elite units are trained in airborne rescue missions. The services have special ops guys who among other things perform daring rescues. Not quite Rambo, rah-rah stuff you see in the movies but still things you should never try at home.
An on-orbit TPS inspection should be accomplished early on all missions, using appropriate assets and capabilities.
Whats this we're hearing about you having problems with your TPS reports?
http://www.digifuzz.net
The 33 day deadline in the article seems a bit artificial to me - you don't need to launch another space shuttle before the consumables run out, instead you could launch an unmanned Russian Progress to resupply the ISS with more food and oxygen. As this is unmanned, doing it in a hurry does not endanger further crew. Any ideas as to why this isn't included in the plan?
You see terrorist use laser pointers to confuse navigation systems of the shuttle.
CCDs came along and rendered the airforce requirment redundant. You launch a satellite and you can get pictures out of it until it dies.
See my journal, I write things there
-- ac at work
Please, stay on topic, take your political statememnts to http://politics.slashdot.org/ this is http://science.slashdot.org/ . oh, and please no slippery slope rebuttal logic.
If you resist reading what you disagree with, how will you ever acquire deeper insights into your own beliefs?
Is not whether to have a rescue shuttle always ready. They can't. They only have three working shuttles and either dedicate one to solely rescue missions, which probably won't happen in the next 100 flights or they reduce their schedule to always piggyback missions (and leave one shuttle always at the end of a run waiting for the other two to be turned around.) Building another is pretty expensive.
NASA's real question is: do we build another shuttle or do we go to a new generation of technology to get payloads into space? Disposable rockets still work the best as for cost efficiency, but the shuttle is oh so much sexier.
So NASA's real question is:
Cost-efficient or sexy?
So long and thanks for all the fish . . . !!!
I'd propose a "tow truck" kind of solution. To pose an analogy, how often do you use the spare tire in your car? Maybe never? (Automakers won't sell a spare-less car mostly due to negative market perception.) If you don't have a spare tire, what will you do?
:-)
A wee bit off topic, but a few cars come without spares these days, thanks to extended mobility tires.
At least one car (2001-2004 Z06 vettes) use regular tires, but have no spare-- instead, you get a cigarette-lighter powered tire pump and a can of fix-a-flat.
But I do see your point.
The whole thing was an overengineered government boondoggle. It didn't make sense then, and doesn't make sense now, while looking at it logically.
And it's mostly an inherited boondoggle.
I don't think that many of the original shuttle designers, managers, engineers, etc. are still working for NASA. Most are retired by now. Or deceased.
Today's engineers and managers are working within the constraints of decisions that were made by an entirely different generation of NASA employees (and politicians).
-CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
Yeah, I know the politicians have restricted the Shuttle missions to the ISS orbitlal plane. That's just a horrible restriction. It's the wrong plane for a payload that needs to go into GTO (or anywhere else useful.) Also, you've increased the risk to the ISS by bringing the Shuttle and it's payload into the same plane. If the payload malfunctions, you've got an awfully large piece of debris in the same plane as the ISS. Any debris left over from non-ISS-specific missions becomes and in-plane impact hazard. So yeah, that restriction sucks no matter how you look at it.
I didn't intend for my original post to be specific to the Shuttle. The solution would, in principle, work for just about any manned mission where a) you could get to the damages ship; and b) the daaged ship has an airlock/egress capability.
Too bad the Soyuz module only seats three. It's almost what you'd want. Of course, that's not a glamorous, high-tech, high-dollar, corporate-welfare program for the US space industry, so I don't expect to see it anytime soon. Another poster noted that the vehicle is worth more than the crew, and I think that's probably correct too (though you won't hear any politicians saying that.)
If the shuttle is abandoned in orbit you can bet it will be in a 120-160 mile LEO. Given the apsect ratio of the craft and the height of the orbit, you can bet the craft wouldn't stay up long. That means that NASA would have three choices: 1) boost the craft to a higher more stable orbit until something can be done, 2) perform a fix and try to land the craft unmanned, 3) de-orbit quickly so the craft wreckage lands where they expect.
1) Unless they plan to have Atlantis permanently tasked as the rescue ship, there is no way this can be done. The booster would have to already be in the cargo bay and good to go. You would prefer to not have to tell the folk in the VAB they've got 1 week plus to take out what ever payload is in the bay and replace it with the booster.
2) This one might actually be feasible. If you assume that the craft is already lost then you can try your fix and bring it down unmanned. If I remember correctly, NASA has already done some tests on completely autonomous landings. Aiming for Edwards AFB gives you lots of room to land and plenty of open area for wreckage if things don't work.
3) Unfortunately we know that NASA/JPL are all to willing to bring down currently functional spacecraft in the name of a known wreckage footprint. The main issue with this would be how long they can wait. How long could the shuttle stay on orbit unmanned and still be able to perform a realtively stable de-orbit? I'm guessing not long.
Now consider this scenario: There is an impact on the leading edge of the wing. The tiles are damaged but they don't appear to be pierced. It's a good bet the craft could be brought down safely. Will NASA have the will to take the chance of losing the crew?
Since the space shuttle was designed to bring back satellites from orbit, I don't think a few extra people would make a difference. Satellites tend to be a lot heavier than people.
Not to mention that the shuttle is so heavy that a few extra people would hardly make a difference in the overall weight.
Agreed 100%... all the more reason that space exploration *must* be wrested away from government beaurocracy. Government (any government) is horribly bad at technology and bad at speed. To allow government to maintain a monopoly on a field requiring both those things is to doom our progress.
Unfortunately corporate America is bad at anything where there's no profit motive. So the question is -- what's the profit motive for space exploration?
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....