Golf-Ball Sized Hail Damages Shuttle

MattSparkes writes "The Shuttles March launch has been delayed to late April after golf-ball sized hail caused 7000 pits and divots in the foam that shields the fuel tank. NASA say it's the worst damage of its kind that they have ever seen, but hail is not a new problem for the agency. In 1982, a hailstorm damaged the sensitive heat shield tiles on the Columbia's wings. The damaged tiles then absorbed about 540 kilograms of rain. Once in space, the orbiter faced the Sun to allow the tiles to dry out."

Comments

Heh, apparently hail ain't their only problem

[bad_fx]

[quote]NASA has had less serious problems with fuel tank foam as well. In 1995, a shuttle on the launch pad had to be returned to its hangar for repairs after woodpeckers punched about a dozen small holes in the tank's insulation.[/quote]

That got a bit of a chuckle; It's in the article linked from TFA.

Paradigm shift

[TWX]

Maybe there really is something to all of those science fiction movies that show space ports opening like a clamshell a few minutes before the spacecraft lifts off, especially if the air inside was temperature and humidity controlled. That kind of thing might have prevented Challenger's destruction and would keep any craft free from weather-related damage before takeoff...

Re:Paradigm shift

[Mercano]

How about, say, something like this? Though I don't know how early in the countdown then need to roll back the building.

Rain

[saskboy]

So Columbia survived a half a ton of rain in its fragile shield, but was brought down by scarring foam. How odd space flight can be...

Re:Rain

[Anonymous Coward]

What is more shocking is the fact that they deliberately took up half a ton of water up into space.

I wonder how much such a worthless payload costs in terms of fuel needs.

Would it not have been cheaper to dry the shuttle while on earth? and spare a couple of hundred liters of fuel?

Maybe they should have invested

[postbigbang]

in a few wee Kevlar umbrellas. For the price of this shading material, which they discovered they needed more than TWO DECADES AGO, they wouldn't have multi-million dollar dent problem.

Re:Obviously

[racermd]

Maybe it's just me, and I don't claim to be a super-smrt - sorry, smart - rocket-scientist (because I'm not), but why don't they put the foam insulation on the inside of the fuel tank shell?

I'm sure there are reasons why they don't, but can those reasons out-weigh the problems it's causing with the foam on the outside?

Does anyone know if this has been considered? If so, why hasn't it been done, yet? Please be as specific as you can. I'm really interested in this.