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The Rise and Fall of NASA's Shuttle-Centaur (arstechnica.com)

Posted by Soulskill on from the did-not-actually-rise-or-fall dept.

An anonymous reader writes: An article at Ars Technica tells the story of Shuttle-Centaur, a NASA project during the mid-1980s to carry a Centaur rocket to orbit within the cargo bay of a space shuttle. As you might expect, shuttle launches became vastly more complex with such heavy yet delicate cargo. Still, officials saw it as an easy way to send probes further into the solar system. They developed a plan to launch Challenger and Atlantis within 5 days of each other in mid-1986 to bring the Ulysses and Galileo probes to orbit, each with its own Shuttle-Centaur. Though popular opinion at the time was that the shuttle program was "unstoppable," individuals within NASA were beginning to push back against slipping safety standards. "While a host of unknowns remained concerning launching a volatile, liquid-fueled rocket stage on the back of a space shuttle armed with a liquid-filled tank and two solid rocket boosters, NASA and its contractors galloped full speed toward a May 1986 launch deadline for both spacecraft." The destruction of Challenger in January, 1986 put Shuttle-Centaur on hold. The safety investigation that ensued quickly came to the conclusion that it presented unacceptable risks, and the project was canceled that June.

4 of 53 comments (clear)

  1. So... by pushing-robot · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It's a rocket with a ridiculously heavy intermediate stage that serves no function but to endanger lives if anything goes wrong.

    I guess when you have a hammer...

    --
    How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    1. Re:So... by 0123456 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The shuttle was supposed to replace all US launchers, because that was the only way to get the flight rate high enough to get anywhere near the original cost claims. Centaur was required to launch heavy payloads, because the solid-fuelled stages that fit in the shuttle's payload bay simply couldn't do so, and the shuttle would be the only option.

      I knew there were safety issues with it, but I hadn't realized just how bad they were until I read this article. Someone should have told them it was batshit crazy well before they got that close to launch. Then again, this was the NASA that thought it could ignore engineers and launch Challenger with frozen, leaky SRBs.

    2. Re:So... by myowntrueself · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I knew there were safety issues with it

      The biggest safety issue was using a manned flight for something that didn't need people. All other things being equal, you will have 10 times the death rate if you launch 100 manned missions rather than 10 manned missions and 90 unmanned rockets. When the Challenger exploded, killing 7 astronauts, it was on a "stick a satellite in orbit" mission, that did not need to be manned.

      The thing is that the Russians had developed their own space shuttle (the Buran), which they abandoned. The interesting thing in this context is that the Buran was fully automated; in its test flight it had no crew (the Russians thought it was too dangerous!) it took off and landed all controlled by automated systems or from the ground.

      Now if the US space shuttle had this capability perhaps these Centaur launches would have been possible.

      Question is, why didn't the USA develop the automated/remotely controlled capabilities that the Russians had??

      --
      In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
    3. Re:So... by towermac · · Score: 4, Interesting

      You're almost right. The crazy shuttle modifications were so that they could bring a Russian satellite back. They are apparently somewhat heavy. And bulky.

      Thus the truck of a shuttle we ended up with; about the power of a Saturn V, and yet couldn't even get to geosynchronous, much less go to the Moon or anything.

      The interesting question is; did they steal a Russian satellite? Would the Russians blow it up if a shuttle approached? Did they include a self destruct? (I guarantee they have one now.)

      Is that the real reason we discontinued the shuttle; since you can't steal Russian satellites anymore, there's no point in having one?