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NASA Probes Shuttle Oxygen Leak
Cherita Chen writes "NASA is investigating the possibility of a gaseous oxygen leak, posing a serious fire risk, during the launch of the space shuttle Discovery in July. From the article: 'Engineers uncovered possible evidence of high concentrations of the gas in the rear engine compartment about two minutes after lift-off. A leak could lead to a fire or even an explosion in flight.'"
See DHMO.org for more info.
High concentrations of oxygen won't combust, it's the lower-middle concentrations (especially mixed with certain other chemicals) you have to watch for.
I believe you're confusing oxygen with a fuel. Oxygen won't combust at all. But putting a solid or liquid fuel in contact with pure oxygen and an ignition source is a recipe for disaster. It's true that if the oxygen concentration were to reach such a high level that all other flammable gasses present were below their LFL the mixture wouldn't burn, but that wouldn't make the situation safe because a more concentrated fuel source could be introduced and you'd have a huge fireball on your hands.
If you can read this sig, you're too close.
Historically, there have been many space flights with very few fatal malfunctions (Challenger and Columbia). There were even more test flights of the shuttle craft. Out of curiosity, has it always been a possibility that an "explosion could happen during flight" but with probability on their side, it didn't?
What I'm trying to say is that you're trying to put a rocket into space with (almost) a piece of the sun on its backside. Aren't there always possibilities of explosions when what's powering you is, essentially, a controlled explosion?
My work here is dung.
I am surprised that no one has mentioned that we have had astronauts killed from this combination: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_1
If you mess with oxygen levels the chances of fire go up quite a bit, one of the reasons why people are paranoid about static electricity some high oxygen environments like operating theatres and decompression chambers.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
As I just happened to read today... http://www.counterpunch.org/grossman12132005.html ...an in-flight explosion could be quite serious if that shuttle happens to be carrying large quantities of plutonium.
Momentarily, the need for the construction of new light will no longer exist.
No, they found out after the shuttle returned and after they could remove and gather and then interpret the data from the detection system. Possibly TFA is crap (BBC is no guarantee) but it's at least mentioned in or easily understood from this article: http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/ft_051211_dis covery_leak.html
Other things to mull over:
- three of the six "catch bottles" (name of the measuring devices) showed completely normal values, one had "corrupt data" (don't ask me why, perhaps a mechanical failure since the catch bottles seem to be mechanical in nature), and two "indicate higher-than-allowable levels of gaseous oxygen"
- if there is a problem at all it is the possibility of a leak somewhere because leaks tend to expand over time
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