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Debris is Shuttle's Biggest Threat
Masq666 writes "Tiny rocks, paint flecks and other fragments of junk whizzing around the Earth pose the greatest threat to the shuttles and the astronauts on board, according to the preliminary results of a new NASA risk study.
Even coin sized fragments can cause great damage to a shuttle, and the damage can be lethal, if it hits the windows or the heat shield."
That kid with the slingshot!
The article doesn't tell us anything we don't know already...
I thought there would be at least mention of new prevention measures, or theoretically possible clean-up solutions being proposed.
Holy crap! You mean debris traveling at thousands of kilometers per hour is hazardous to a vehicle that's also taveling at thousands of kilometetrs an hour? Seems to me this was already known and isn't a danger only to the shuttle but to anything in orbit.
You are so boring that when I see you my feet go to sleep.
That debris layer is our ablative "alien shield" defense system. Bring 'em on!
--
make install -not war
Why don't they just raise the shields?
It is just sad that humans smart enough to put objects in space are still not smart enough to not make a stinking mess out of everything. As the old saying goes "Don't shit where you live."
San Francisco Photographers
Mega Maid!
maybe you should have a watch of this Anime series -all to do with the lives of "Debree Collectors" quite relevant to this story indeed
Mission "Space-Dump", to dispose of excess rocks, paint, coins and the homeless, has been a sucess.
Force Fields. (or something equivalent!)
No, the debris is not harmless because to be at the same altitude it has to be at the same speed as the shuttle. It can still be in a different orbit, even a perpendicular one.
Of course little bits of rock are probably more of a threat than big bits of rocks. Sure the big ones might make a dent but the surface area of a small one is much less and therefore much more likely to make a puncture mark.
Or as one of my university professors once said
"When you are travelling faster than a rifle bullet, its a bit of an issue when you hit something that is the size of a rifle bullet"
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
You'd have figured a computer problem more likely for this shuttle...but if it's got to be derbis it'll probably be 4x6x9 in it's dimensions, perfectly smooth and total black and unreflective. Oh yes, it'll be full of stars. We better have the Alexei Leonov ready to launch incase we need a rescue mission.
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups. -- 0 1 My two bits
Somewhere, I read, or saw, or heard, or made up, that theoretically we could put so much junk in orbit that one collision would trigger a chain reaction, wrapping the Earth in a cloud of junk, making space travel from Earth impossible. And knocking out all our satelites.
With great power comes great electricity bills.
I think exploding fuel tanks and foam insulation have done far more damage than any paint flecks. The biggest threat to the shuttle is management overriding safety concerns in favor of keeping schedules or to save money.
When all else fails, run.
I read somewhere that since they eject (or did at some point) their bodily wastes from the space station, everything that returns from orbit is now covered in a thin coat of urine.
Anyone know if this is true/false? Google doesn't show anything.
If true, I guess that changes the meaning of "whizzing around the Earth"
how bout defense weapons? or super strong magnetic fields (that somehow only repel incoming objects)?
...Captain Quark and his intrepid crew!
Especially the Clones. Oh yes, the clones...
Just wondering, because I read that since Congress actually called them out on it, they're trying to retroactively produce their risk analysis to justify the decision, and this is the kind of bullshit that sounds an awful lot like their same old "we're too scared to do anything anymore" attitude.
Software piracy is victimless theft.
Not Quark! http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/series/DS9/c haracter/1112445.html
This Quark!http://www.tvparty.com/recquark.html
Could certainly use his services to keep our orbits clean!
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
Slightly different issue.
The foam debris was SIB (Self-Induced B.S.), compounded by the fossilization of NASA, as the engineers devolved into bureaucrats.
Something are as ugly, but what is uglier than an I-told-you-so written in human blood and debris across a continent?
These orbital objects are like software bugs in that you know they exist, but unlike software bugs in that there is no possibility of a re-boot. So you need good 'exception handling'.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
We've known this for years and years, like come on, of course things going at thousands of miles an hour could cause damage to things flying at thousands's of miles an hour, duh, but why, with all the satelites orbiting earth, and all the shuttles sent up haven't ever been severly damaged (columbia doesnt count because thats not what happened) by the shit? You can't call it luck, maybe if we only had the shuttles, but there are hundreds of satelites orbiting the earth 24/7, so why don't they get hit?
I can envision a future in which an immense shield would have to be co-orbited a few minutes ahead of the shuttle.
The shield wouldn't have to be very thick to dissipate the small momentum-high kinetic energy particles. For a missile of serious mass the shuttle could provide crucial seconds of early warning.
If it were two layer, you could also get an instantaneous estimate of size and velocity.
the moon really isn't made of cheese.
And by the way, even a paint fleck moving at that kind of speed presents a risk to the shuttle.
- Think for yourself, question authority.-
...and the damage can be lethal, if it hits the windows or the heat shield.
...so you're saying the only good place to hit is what - the engines? That doesn't seem right...
Sure, debris in space is hazardous to the shuttle. It's also hazardous to everything else up there, too - including any other manned vehicles we might put up, the ISS, and the entire constellation of satellites in LEO.
If we're going to stop sending shuttles up, that's not the best reason - the reason to get rid of the shuttles is because they're too expensive, too unreliable, and too inherently flawed for what they can do. Not because they might get punctured by space debris.
Meanwhile, what we (meaning any terrestrial space agency, not just the US) should be doing is preparing the next suitable for LEO vehicle that can solve most of the shuttle's flaws, and then used unmanned rockets to get cargo into space.
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
Funny... I would have thought the shuttle's biggest threat would be the current administration.
Afterall, you won't need to worry about FOD if you have to worry about getting off the ground in the first palce.
Sometimes I wish I was a plumber, then I'd know how to deal with other people's shit.
Is this the same "risk study" that they failed to do when they arbitrarily decided to destroy the Hubble telescope rather than repair their most successful scientific mission to date?
/. and you are trying vainly to come up with some sort of continuity to the whole of NASA's efforts by piecing together only the bits reported on by stories here.
It sounds to me like your only source of news is
Shurely Shuttle's biggest threat is the mac-mini?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I think NASA watches debris in space larger than a baseball, but it's simply not feasible to track anything smaller. Unfortunately, things even as small as a fleck of paint pose a dangerous threat to the shuttles and anything else in orbit.
One of those orbiting flecks of paint impacted a window of the Challenger back in the 1980s. It left a noticeable gouge.
Article on Meterorites with picture of paint fleck impact
UFO -4: High Speed Collisions
Git those space convicts out there.
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
Isn't everything IN ORBIT going in approximately the same direction at approximately the same speed? Incoming meteorites are not in orbit so I can see why they are a threat.
Maybe this is the kick in the pants that NASA, ESA, JSA, and others need to ensure that they stop leaving junk up there.
Satellites and other space-borne objects need to be equipped with some means of safely deorbiting them, or else we're soon going to find that putting anything up in orbit and having it say there unharmed will be nigh on impossible.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
The shuttle needs some serious design revisions and these latest findings only serve to underline this. I think the following changes are required:
a) Separate the rear propulsion units from the main vehicle and keep them as far apart as possible.
b) Increase the area of the heat shield, while allowing for a narrow profile in orbit (using, say, a large saucer shape).
c) Fit a big deflector shield to the front of the main drive section.
d) Install maintenance tunnels throughout the ship (all of which can be based on exactly the same design)
e) Give the captain a bigger, more comfortable, chair and tell him to lighten up with his crewmen at the end of each encounter.
Debris is Shuttle's Biggest Threat
No, gravity is the shuttle's biggest threat.
I thought the biggest threat was incorrect assembly (Columbia), manufacturing defects (Challenger) and parts falling off at launch (Columbia).
... we're not only trashing the planet, we're trashing the space around it too. No wonder this world sucks. And we're looking for another planet to colonize?!
We need to learn to live in harmony on Earth before we go looking for another planet to trash.
Why does humanity continue to bite the hand that feeds it?
"Only two things are inevitable... the universe and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe."
- Albert Einstein
Funny, cause NASA and other space organizations are responsible for paint specs, nuts, bolts, golf balls and the like- they caused their own problem
There is a semi-serious idea that we will eventually launch so much crap up there that we will have to wait for it to fall out of orbit before we can safely launch any new missions...
# cat
Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
science fiction has long been becoming science...
sounds like it's about time for the government (or someone) to make shield technology a reality...
Parent is hilarious.
I know nothing about the subject, but wouldn't there be more debris in a geosync orbit than one where the debris would either come crashing to earth or flung out into space?
It's not enough to see (yet!), but the Earth has
rings of space junk now. Popular orbits contribute
the most junk of course, with plenty from launch
equipment. Then it gets moved around by various
effects -- moon, solar and magnetic stuff, etc.
So there are high-risk and low-risk areas.
It would be nice to just avoid the high-risk areas,
but that isn't so easy. Sometimes you have to pass
through them, especially since fuel is limited.
As if that wasn't bad enough, there's the South
Atlantic Anomoly to worry about. This is a place
where the Earth's magnetic field provides less
protection from solar radiation, so you'd like to
choose an orbit that minimizes time spent there.
Well, avoiding the one problem may push you into
the other problem.
This wouldn't have been a problem if we'd just built the Millenium Falcon like our interstellar neighbors in a galaxy far, far away once did.
My digital rights don't need management.
I know. Right! Everyone knows that in The Next Generation, episode 132, the do not raise their sheild when entering earth's atmosphere. Idiots!
(This was made-up for humor. Please do not respond with what really happened in episode 132, or if they ever did not raise their sheild when entering earth's atmoshere. Thank you)
The thing posing the greatest risk are the sorts of things which have already brought two shuttles, or the astronaughts have been quite unnaturally lucky in the many flights.
Scrapping the shuttle without any plans for a replacement and no way to pay for it if we did, is just another nail in the coffin of medicrity that the US has laid herself down in. In 3 years we will see plans annouced to outsource manned space missions to China and India. It will be sold as a cost savings but what it really will be is an acknowledgment that the US is no longer capable of producting anything but an entire country of middle managers, ad execs and wal-mart clerks.
We're still in the very early stages of spaceflight. It's still dangerous, and it will continue to be dangerous for decades to come. And debris in orbit is only a small factor. The Challenger wasn't hit by debris in space. Neither was Columbia for that matter. Should we stop going into space because of some debris? No. Should we stop going because of the other dangers? I'll tell you what, if we come to a point where the astronauts who are risking their lives, decide it's too dangerous, then I'll start to listen. After all, they're more acquainted with the exact nature of the dangers they face than any civilian or politician (John Glenn excepted).
You want to talk dangerous, go be a soldier in Iraq. That's dangerous. Why don't we outlaw wars, particularly unjustified, needless ones.
And while we're on the topic of dangerous, let's talk about automobiles? They're not a great deal safer than the space shuttle.. Why don't we actually make driving tests difficult in the U.S. and outlaw people who can't drive? That will really save lives.
Space flight is certainly not going to get safer if we stop doing it. The only way to improve is to just continue doing it and making improvements as we learn. Will some astronauts die? Of course. And they know that. It's the risk they signed up for. Why not let them be the ones to decide whether or not it's worth it.
I'd wager that the biggest threat to Shuttle is hanging the payload off the SIDE of the rocket. That has doomed 2 Shuttles already, while orbital debris has only caused minor damage. No "but, this COULD be a bigger threat", either - the major danger to Shuttle and crew is one of the vehicle's "features". Rockets with payload and launch-escape system on top of the contained explosion are inherently safer than mounting the valuables next to the explosives.
Capsules and rocket-launched cargo make so much more sense than this pseudo-plane. If we are going to have "spaceplanes", they should be in the heritage of x-15 and SS1, not Shuttle. 'We' in this context is the US and the open passenger market mostly. If tickets were available right now, I wouldn't even consider flying on Shuttle, whereas Soyuz, SS1 or any of the historical capsules are all safe enough. Compare the evidence of Soyuz, Apollo or X-15 to Shuttle for safe ops vs. a dangerous design.
I'm going to be real cynical for a moment: Not A Space Agency shouldn't be allowed to say Not Another Shuttle Accident ever again! Never A Straight Answer from them...
The fleet should be grounded and put in a museum and that money rolled into a crash capsule fly-off prize (1 year unmanned, 3 years first manned) and after that paying for tickets instead of operations and hardware.
Josh
gigantino.tv - Heavy but weighs nothing.
Resulting in a 'Blue screen of death'?
This is not news. Not even for nerds.
This would have been news for nerds in the mid-1960s.
Now it's news for your grandmother who still thinks power steering is "faintsy".
I remember something on TV about how someone was shooting projectiles out of a cannon through inch thick steel plates. To stop the projectile they used two plates only 1/8 inch thick separated by few inches of open space. The projectile shattered upon impact of the first plate and spread out enough so the energy was directed over a much larger surface area and failed to penetrate the second plate. I was wondering if NASA had something like this already in place on the shuttle or if it is even feasable because of the added weight.
"A good dog don't shit in his own back yard"
"A broken clock tells the correct time twice a day"
Journalists have many expressions for this.
I could have swarned that NASA had a project to collect or at least slow down some of these objects in orbit. It was supposed to be a huge sponge or something. Anyway,about a year ago or so, the project go cancelled for no reason.
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
Even coin sized fragments can cause great damage to a shuttle, and the damage can be lethal, if it hits the windows or the heat shield.
Oh yeah? Prove it!
There have been proposals to use small satellites to grab and push objects into a retrograde orbit to burn up in atmosphere. For even smaller things, you could use some kind of mesh or aerogel to catch the objects, then once the sweeper sat has collected enough material, it retros the whole thing.
Of course, the idea also leads to the idea of having small booster satellites being used to extend the life of satellites whose electronics are still good, but have exhausted their reaction mass.
I don't read AC A human right
As everyone who reads What's New by Bob Park http://www.aps.org/WN/ knows, the shuttle has no scientific value. Humans in space are a huge waste of money. Robots are far superior.
/rant mode on
Space junk has been a fact of life in low earth orbit for decades. There is everything up there from gloves to nuts and bolts, all merrily circling the earth. Then we go and send our highly-trained citizens up there who are totally unprepared for any eventuality that they might get so much as a sprained elbow. NOT!
NASA astronauts have been prepared to die for space exploration ever since NACA was reformed into NASA. It's a complete bunch of nonesense to suggest that missions to outer space in general, low earth orbit speficically, might not be dangerous. Spacesuits may leak, spacecraft (including the ISS) may leak or be hit by debris, solar flares can permanently sterilize humans in space, if not kill them outright from the radiation. One reason why we all don't live in space is because there's darn little to eat up there and it's kind of hard to breathe (pardon the sarcasm here).
Now NASA has become the Great Ball-less Wonder suddenly, all worried about "safety." Oh, we can't extend the life of Hubbel because it's dangerous; Oh we can't send up too many missions because some space debris could hit the Shuttle; Oh it's going to take decades to go to Mars or return to the moon because someone could wet their drawers and cause a short in their suit. Gods, what a bunch of absolute bull castings!
NASA hires test pilots to pilot the Shuttle. You think, maybe they're as lily-livered as all of this? No, they're test pilots. They do everything possible to minimize risks and then they take necessary risks to test planes and learn their performance characteristics -- either so that a faulty design may be grounded until it's fixed or so that the integrity of the aircraft checks out and new pilots (of the non-test variety) may be checked out with proper procedures to fly more safely within the aircraft's performance envelope.
And the Shuttle pretty much happens to be a "permanent test platform" because of the nature of outer space and low earth orbit. In essence, NASA pilots are debriefed on the intimate details of Shuttle performance on every flight -- just as if that flight was the first one ever.
If we could somehow resurrect Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee or the crew of the Shuttle Challenger they'd look at this obvious NASA ploy to try to stop flying manned missions with the absolute disgust and derision it ought to receive. Space is dangerous to humans. No kidding! Now get over it and go back to what we ought to do: More manned missions.
/rant mode off
Gods don't kill people, people with gods kill people.
"At 1/5 the speed of light, dust and atoms might not do significant damage even in a voyage of 40 years, but the faster you go, the worse it is - space begins to become abrasive. When you begin to approach the speed of light, hydrogen atoms become cosmic-ray particles, and they will fry the crew. So 60,000 kilometers per second may be the practical speed limit for space travel."
This announcement comes as NASA is considering abandoning yet another multi billion dollar satilite to become space junk, then complaining about it.
I thought that Cassler's syndrome was very well know since the first years of the '90. ;-)
You can probably get to know more on this problem by reading "Planetes", a (moderately) sci-fi manga in 4 volumes, instead of TFA.
42.
This has been a problem for the last 40 years and, as far as I know, hasn't suddenly become any worse.
Anyway all objects > 10cm are currently being tracked and catalogued by USSPACECOM radar. I guess eventually we'll reach a point where blasting these debris out of orbit with an Earth or space based laser will become a necessity.
I have in fact been in simulator training for just this job for the last 10 years, and as an added bonus I am also able to accurately hit those bloody annoying UFOS that make the woo woo woo noise.
God was my co-pilot, but then we crashed and I was forced to eat him.
I thought the combo of the weather and the not as good foam tile glue did it. Supposedly IIRC they had to switch types of glue to something more green, which didn't stick as well.
Either way I say ground them, and drag the russian proton out of mothballs and use that thing for the time being.
So many sci-fi concepts have become reality - what is holding up the development of the two defences that USS Enterprise has against space debris?:
1. Deflector dish - tracks and deflects oncoming space junk.
2. Shields - high-energy devices producing protective envelope around the craft!
Surely the Star Wars defense shield project can neutralise flecks of paint!
Get some nukes up there to squeegee the most common orbit paths clean of all the crap up there, including frozen Soviet satellite fuel globs which are untrackable by radar.
"Only two things are *infinite*... the universe and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe."
- Albert Einstein
Why did Crista Macauliffe lose her teaching job?
She blew up in front of the class.
Am I the only one who thought of this as relating to the iPOD? You'd think that Steve Jobs' "reality distortion field" would be able to shield it from just about anything!
Its been said before and I will say it again here.
The shuttle has to go.
It should have been replaced years ago with not one but two new spacecraft.
One would be a heavy lift launcher capable of launching things like parts for the international space station etc. The ideal solution here is just a big rocket engine (or engines) designed to be as cheap as possible to make and launch without the need for fancy systems.
Should have a low turn-around time so that once one is launched the time it takes to get ready for another launch is low.
The second vehicle would be designed to carry crew, tools, equipment, instruments, docking modules (so it can link with space stations like the ISS) and so on. It would be reusable (with as few components needing replacement after each use as possible). Such a vehicle would not need the design compromises that make the space shuttle the way it is.
I give up, why do we have windows on the space shuttle? In case they have to fly to space manually? If its for the view, how about moveable covers for them or something so they stay protected 99% of the time?
I'm Rick James with mod points biatch!
I agree we already new this but it is interesting to be able to see that warnings have finally proven true that space garbage was a bad idea.
Life is too short for a 40 hour work week.
2. Collect debris left on the moon
3. Profit!!!
(c'mon, it was what, 1979? Too young to know what I'm talking about? Here:
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Launchpad/9 782/salvage1.html
What is even more interesting is Nasa's solution. The committee concluded that all space shuttles should be retrofitted with defelector dishes (capable of creating tachyon beams) before any future launches.
Where is MEGA MAID when you need her?
;)
Suck...Suck...Suck...
Besides...if space is just a big vaccum, why doesn't someone just change the bag?
DEAD DEAD DEAD DELETE ME
You want to talk dangerous, go be a soldier in Iraq. That's dangerous. Why don't we outlaw wars, particularly unjustified, needless ones.
Stop your slander now, and there will not be a war.
And while we're on the topic of dangerous, let's talk about automobiles? They're not a great deal safer than the space shuttle.. Why don't we actually make driving tests difficult in the U.S. and outlaw people who can't drive? That will really save lives.
You're slandering again. This means war! Seriously, get your head out of your ass. Probability does not apply to people because they all are unique and any sequence of tests is not identical. I suppose you were contimplating the bann of weapons of mass destruction, yet your strapping a bunch of amateurs in a paper airplane to a giant friggin missile and blasting them through the troposphere; external combustion machines are much, much, more dangerous than anything mustered by internal combustion machines.
The real greatest threat to the shuttle are the morons who decided it would be OK to fund this study.
Damn bureaucrats!
I am so glad the private sector is taking over the space program, Washington and NASA have become seriously stupid as of late.
They still use the smaller version, it's their main rocket. Launches stuff all the time. The deal with it is, it's designed to scale UP pretty easy, all the way to moon or mars missions probably, heavy satellites, etc.. that's why it's a good design. It's your basic space truck, which is what we need, not some tempermental sportscar thing that happens to coincidently haul cargo once in awhile.. It's there, ain't no mothballs to it, although point taken on the spare parts for vodka deal, I'm sure it happens over there, and over here as well. Google for "surplus" mil hardware waltzing out the door in Huntsville for an example, a pretty big hardly-reported and on going scandal, mainly involving retired flag rankers making their pile in "private" industry now. I'd call it looting the tax payer and compromising national security, and maybe the T word, but it ain't my call on what goes on at those big bucks levels. Just what it looks like to me.
Anyway, Here's some handy recent references to the Proton showing it's various uses and what's been launched recently with them and what's coming up scheduled. It's turned out to be the "slant 6" of rockets, along with our atlas. They "just work". I say just use them until we figure out gravity distortion or whatever drives, if that ever happens. If it was my call the shuttles would have been grounded years ago,they turned out to be way too expensive to be practical. To be fair, the original idea was good and I liked it,(I was always in favor of the x-planes/spaceshipone styled piggyback designs as being the best for reusable craft) but after they had weird budget problems and instituted constant design changes and it became mostly political and "national prestige" the original ideas went down the drain and it became a big fat expensive engineering waste. More or less, mostly more, IMO. Too bad, had high hopes for it too.
The most damage done to the shuttles has been due to screwups from NASA management.
The two destroyed shuttles didn't suffer from random debris, they were destroyed by flaws in the supposedly engieered system.
3/5 of them so far have been destroyed by such.
Assume some sort of non-chipping bulletproof lexan/carbon fiber/aerogel sandwich-like combo exists (you get the idea, i know the materials are probably wrong)
Why not deploy a large object capable of absorbing impacts, and retaining debris?
in essence, make a giant shuttle window, to intentionally catch paint flakes, that could be eventually de-orbited?
foolish, i'm sure, but, please, i'm curious as to Why.
There have been two confirmed accidental collisions of orbiting objects.
1996 - A chunk of an ariane booster lops off the gravity gradient boom on Cerise
17 Jan 2005 - A chunk of a chinese booster collides with an old US rocket moter resulting in 1 new tracked piece of debris.
That said, AFSPC is not, IMHO doing a very good job of maintaining the catalog (and I'm in a position to know) - the current catalog is a fraction of what they have the technical capacity to track. And they also do a poor job of looking for & confirming potential collision. So we really don't know how many there have been and what the risk truly is.
In fact, they only do regular conjunction assessments for about 50 military payloads, and won't provide the data needed (SP data for all cataloged objects) for other operators to do it themselves. There are huge "political" issues in improving the system coupled with an enormous case of NIH. It's the stuff of 60 minutes if you could get the right people to talk, but frankly people have lost their jobs & been basically blacklisted for attempting to point out these issues.
An example of a "smoking gun" - when AFSPC reviewed their data from Columbia incident they discovered that - lo & behold, they had actually tracked an object separating from the shuttle prior to its fatal reentry. Likely a piece of the leading edge. If their processes had been up to snuff, they might have provided some warning. It might not have helped, but still...
Finally, there's a big gap between the size of the object that could cause serious damage, and the size of object that we can currently track. Some estimates for the debris population > 1CM approach 100000 objects.