Here is the full story. The first tank they installed on Discovery had a problem with the same sensors. They yanked the orbiter off that tank and onto a new tank.
Before they slid the shuttle on, NASA had an oppertunity to fill the tank and test the sensors. They chose not to, figuring that the problem wouldn't show up on the new tank. So the assembled the orbiter and wheeled it out, and the first all-up test on this new tank was when they filled it for launch.
Since NASA has not track record with this system, they can't rule out anything. They will have to take the shuttle back to the VAB, dismount it, open up the tank, yank out the sensors, and test them on a bench.
The best case scenario is actually that the sensors themselves are wonky. Otherwise they are going to have to trace back all of the electrical connections, the diagnostic equipment, and re-evaluate the testing procedure.
All of this should have been done already.
In the private sector, somebody's head would be on a stick in the lobby for a costly goof like this one.
Silly me. I would have thought the designers of cars would have a float sensor or a flow meter that would detect a lack of fuel and cut power to the pump...
...then again, my Focus blew out it's engine because it's thermostat wasn't working. At the same time the temperature sensor was also not working. When we finally got a new block in, and installed, with a new thermostat and a new thermocouple we the engine still overheated. The cooling fan was also busted.
Mr. Focus was sent to the glue factory at that point.
Unlike your car engine, where a loss of fuel simply stops the process, the shuttle actually has to suck in the fuel out of the tank, and then ram the propellent into the nozzel at a pretty high rate of speed.
If you tried to run the engines without any fuel in them, it would be like putting your foot to the floor when the transmission is in neutral. Without a load the engine spins faster and faster until parts start flying off.
On the shuttle, the turbines are large enough that a catostrophic failure would probably destroy most of the equipment in the tail end of the craft. This includes the orbital maneuvering system, the hydrolic system, several fuel cells, and the rearmost parts of the cargo bay. You also run an outside risk of damaging the tail and flight surfaces on the wings.
Depending on where the sensors are located, engineers may need to remove the orbiter from the boosters. That requires towing the shuttle back to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB).
On STS-98 the launch was pushed back 2 weeks when they had to roll the shuttle back to the VAB to repair a damaged cable on one of the SRB's.
While only one system in the top 10 is x86, if you look at the whole list there are plenty of x86 supercomputers out there. Even Cray is using Opteron in one of its line
If you have picked up any trade rags from 8 years ago (damn, have I been out of school that long?) Intel WAS betting the farm on Itanic. Yes, they have been able to stay major in the market by continually warming over old designs, but it really hasn't had a major hit since the Pentium III. (The Pentium M re-uses swaths of the old PIII architecture.)
What saved them was the fact that there are few, if any, applications for computers that required much computing power beyond 800 Mhz. Even video games generally are a strain on customized components like Graphics cards and DVD drives.
If you look at applications where performance really matters, i.e. supecomputing clusters, they are running Alphas, Power5s, or Itaniums.
If it was anything like my EE class (1998 era) they were also handing out Itanium architecture manuals, Itanium platform reference guides, a book about Processor Architecture written by a guy from Intel, taught by a professor who drank out of an "intel" mug, and the cute female grad student had an "intel inside" t-shirt on with an arrow pointing down.
Actually we switched from Linux to OS X for the hardware.
You can purchase a spare parts kit. In essence, it's an extra copy of all the components that could possibly fail. Between this and a call to tech support, I could have a server running in a few minutes. If I use a part, they ship me a new one.
Dell doesn't even sell spare logic boards. The last time we called for hardware support, the instructions they gave would have erased our RAID array. This for a simple diagnostic. The mac equipment will TELL you what is wrong on a happy JAVA app.
The problem with the Columbia had nothing to do with cameras. Rather it was a failure on the part of the NASA management to work the the information it had on hand. They knew something hit the orbiter. They had pictures of things hitting the orbiter. They had engineers telling them that strikes where the stuff hit will cause bad things to happen.
Their answer was to hope for the best, and all the cameras in the world would have brought Columbia home. Okay, home safely.
With the old model, you write a series and if it flops early on, you have 7 or 8 hours of programming that flop. And even if it takes off, it might turn on maybe half your target audience, and turn off the rest. Once people decide something is good or bad it's hard to change their opinion. And with Sci-Fi, good and bad are a personal taste.
With this new model, viewers at least have to watch it before they figure out its crap. And now you have them for 2 hours!
And next week, you start with a fresh slate and a new premise. Will it be good? Will it be awful? Will it be awful, but good? Stay tuned...
...And if you really liked it, pick it up on DVD.
Re:Rather than hire known B directors and writers
on
Sci-Fi on the Cheap
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· Score: 1
They key is consistency. A B writer will crank out a script in the time alotted. He/She has a formula that is more or less on the pulse of the audience.
Kids right out of school think they are going to change the world. They produce stuff that is overly serious, to the point of painful. They make costly changes that really chew up the budget.
In other words, I think the major studios are hiring them.
Aw heck, you just need a ball field, a major landmark, an Army Hospital, and some sort of Manor house for the physicist.
The temporary dwelling of Klatuu would have to be re-worked. We don't really have boarding houses anymore.
And instead of knocking out all the electrical power in the world (completely implausible) have him hijack every computer and media network simultaneously, and beam his message all big-head like. I'm having visions of "...and if you will not seek peace..." scrolling across IM windows and Blackberries.
The problem there is a numbnuts setting off a nuclear bomb in the upper reaches of the atmosphere. Enough material to cause trouble. No ground to get in the way of the expanding sphere of gas. Tons of EMP that cover thousands of square miles, knocking out everything on the ground and in the space above.
Orbital bombardment would work but I don't think it is called assasination than.
No, I think you call that "A good start".
Re:Why do swing votes have to be so important?
on
Justice O'Connor Retiring
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· Score: 2, Interesting
By the time a case gets to the Supreme court, it's so arbitrary and so specific that just about any system would be "unjust."
By definition, the Supreme Court is filling in the gaps where the law isn't clear. If there was a clear cut way to decide the case, it would have been.
It's a misunderstanding to think of the Supreme Court as the "Championship" level of the Legal System. You don't get to appeal because you lost a case. Your appeal has to either prove an error on the part of the proceedings, or some novel question of law. SCOTUS acts like that wizened old Engineer whose been around since the start of the project, and elaborates on details that elude all the lower levels of problem solvers.
I think liberal vs. conservative is not nearly as important as arguing law vs. arguing one's faith system.
When one's arguments are based on law, we can go to the law and discuss. If someone is alienated, you have the constitution to back you up, that the american people fought and died to bring about.
When one's arguments are based on personal faith, even pratictioners of your own faith may differ with you. If someone is alienated, the debate comes down to "my God is bigger than your God." And just about every faith system in America was, at one time or another, at the wrong end of those discussions, remembers it, and does not want to see it happen again.
Actually we more or less funneled arms and money in to found, and prop up both governments.
For the record, Afganistan was a fundimentalist Regime, not a Fascism. And Iraq didn't really have enough of an industrial base to be rightfully called a Facism.
How many Native Americans did we strip of their land, send off to die in reservations, and/or outright kill during the 19th century. Can you say "millions." I knew you could.
Now get off your high horse. War is about economic or political advantage. Afganistan may have been justifiable as retribution for housing Al-Queda. But Iraq was just plain stupid on so many grounds both economic and political that Bush is going to give Warren Harding a run for his money for the title of "Worst President."
Slashdot Mirror
Duke Nukem is going to be released in tiny peices over Texas?
Tell me about it. The Boy Scouts are better organized.
Before they slid the shuttle on, NASA had an oppertunity to fill the tank and test the sensors. They chose not to, figuring that the problem wouldn't show up on the new tank. So the assembled the orbiter and wheeled it out, and the first all-up test on this new tank was when they filled it for launch.
Since NASA has not track record with this system, they can't rule out anything. They will have to take the shuttle back to the VAB, dismount it, open up the tank, yank out the sensors, and test them on a bench.
The best case scenario is actually that the sensors themselves are wonky. Otherwise they are going to have to trace back all of the electrical connections, the diagnostic equipment, and re-evaluate the testing procedure.
All of this should have been done already.
In the private sector, somebody's head would be on a stick in the lobby for a costly goof like this one.
Mr. Focus was sent to the glue factory at that point.
If you tried to run the engines without any fuel in them, it would be like putting your foot to the floor when the transmission is in neutral. Without a load the engine spins faster and faster until parts start flying off.
On the shuttle, the turbines are large enough that a catostrophic failure would probably destroy most of the equipment in the tail end of the craft. This includes the orbital maneuvering system, the hydrolic system, several fuel cells, and the rearmost parts of the cargo bay. You also run an outside risk of damaging the tail and flight surfaces on the wings.
Not a fun thought at all.
Depending on where the sensors are located, engineers may need to remove the orbiter from the boosters. That requires towing the shuttle back to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB).
On STS-98 the launch was pushed back 2 weeks when they had to roll the shuttle back to the VAB to repair a damaged cable on one of the SRB's.
Linq
We really need a decent sarcasm tag on this board.
Last I checked, the Opteron was an AMD offering.
What saved them was the fact that there are few, if any, applications for computers that required much computing power beyond 800 Mhz. Even video games generally are a strain on customized components like Graphics cards and DVD drives.
If you look at applications where performance really matters, i.e. supecomputing clusters, they are running Alphas, Power5s, or Itaniums.
Yeah, I had that class.
You can purchase a spare parts kit. In essence, it's an extra copy of all the components that could possibly fail. Between this and a call to tech support, I could have a server running in a few minutes. If I use a part, they ship me a new one.
Dell doesn't even sell spare logic boards. The last time we called for hardware support, the instructions they gave would have erased our RAID array. This for a simple diagnostic. The mac equipment will TELL you what is wrong on a happy JAVA app.
I'm an Engineer, and I can't tell you how many Journalism and English majors I've had to introduce to "Elements of Style."
Most don't bother because there's no Cliff's Notes or "For Dummies" version.
Their answer was to hope for the best, and all the cameras in the world would have brought Columbia home. Okay, home safely.
With this new model, viewers at least have to watch it before they figure out its crap. And now you have them for 2 hours!
And next week, you start with a fresh slate and a new premise. Will it be good? Will it be awful? Will it be awful, but good? Stay tuned...
Kids right out of school think they are going to change the world. They produce stuff that is overly serious, to the point of painful. They make costly changes that really chew up the budget.
In other words, I think the major studios are hiring them.
The temporary dwelling of Klatuu would have to be re-worked. We don't really have boarding houses anymore.
And instead of knocking out all the electrical power in the world (completely implausible) have him hijack every computer and media network simultaneously, and beam his message all big-head like. I'm having visions of "...and if you will not seek peace..." scrolling across IM windows and Blackberries.
I think it went out with the discovery of Fire. Particularly flame wars.
Besides. You aren't going to like the answer the computer gives you. You really aren't going to like it.
The problem there is a numbnuts setting off a nuclear bomb in the upper reaches of the atmosphere. Enough material to cause trouble. No ground to get in the way of the expanding sphere of gas. Tons of EMP that cover thousands of square miles, knocking out everything on the ground and in the space above.
No, I think you call that "A good start".
By definition, the Supreme Court is filling in the gaps where the law isn't clear. If there was a clear cut way to decide the case, it would have been.
It's a misunderstanding to think of the Supreme Court as the "Championship" level of the Legal System. You don't get to appeal because you lost a case. Your appeal has to either prove an error on the part of the proceedings, or some novel question of law. SCOTUS acts like that wizened old Engineer whose been around since the start of the project, and elaborates on details that elude all the lower levels of problem solvers.
When one's arguments are based on law, we can go to the law and discuss. If someone is alienated, you have the constitution to back you up, that the american people fought and died to bring about.
When one's arguments are based on personal faith, even pratictioners of your own faith may differ with you. If someone is alienated, the debate comes down to "my God is bigger than your God." And just about every faith system in America was, at one time or another, at the wrong end of those discussions, remembers it, and does not want to see it happen again.
On several levels.
For the record, Afganistan was a fundimentalist Regime, not a Fascism. And Iraq didn't really have enough of an industrial base to be rightfully called a Facism.
How many Native Americans did we strip of their land, send off to die in reservations, and/or outright kill during the 19th century. Can you say "millions." I knew you could.
Now get off your high horse. War is about economic or political advantage. Afganistan may have been justifiable as retribution for housing Al-Queda. But Iraq was just plain stupid on so many grounds both economic and political that Bush is going to give Warren Harding a run for his money for the title of "Worst President."