NASA Decides No Fix Needed for Endeavor's Tiles

bhmit1 writes "It looks like NASA is reporting that no repairs are needed for Endeavor. 'After meeting for five hours, mission managers opted Thursday night against any risky spacewalk repairs, after receiving the results of one final thermal test. The massive amount of data indicated Endeavor would suffer no serious structural damage during next week's re-entry. Their worry was not that Endeavor might be destroyed and its seven astronauts killed in a replay of the Columbia disaster — the gouge is too small to be catastrophic. They were concerned that the heat of re-entry could weaken the shuttle's aluminum frame at the damaged spot and result in lengthy post-flight repairs.'"

Comments

Re:Hey, NASA, here's an idea...

[Billosaur]

But that's the difference between an aircraft and a spacecraft -- an aircraft pilot can look his plane over, read up on the maintenance, talk to his ground crew and then decide to fly or not. In NASA, it works differently. A Space Shuttle commander has command of the spacecraft, but Mission Control in Houston has command of the mission. You have to remember: the crew of the Shuttle can't just go bombing around in Earth orbit like they are flying the Millennium Falcon. Every move has to be choreographed and planned out months and even years in advance. When unexpected problems crop up, the technicians on the ground certainly know more about the workings of the machine than the crew, as they have all the data at the fingertips, they are experts in their systems, and they can draw on contractor resources to get more information. Decisions like this cannot be left to the spacecraft commander; his/her job is hard enough without having to keep in their head the compendious amount of information regarding their spacecraft.

It has been this way since Mercury; it was Chris Kraft who outlined the need for the ground to have the skills required to manage the mission and deal with problems in real time, so that the crew could concentrate on their activities in space. The system has worked extremely well over all these years, with the exception of the Columbia accident. I for one am confident that NASA knows what it is doing and will take all the precautions it can before Endeavour is allowed to land.