Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: Mitchel Tighe
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/835422/posts

Columbia Was Beyond Any Help, Officials Say

Even if flight controllers had known for certain that protective heat tiles on the underside of the space shuttle had sustained severe damage at launching, little or nothing could have been done to address the problem, NASA officials say.

Virtually since the hour Columbia went down, the space agency has been peppered with possible options for repairing the damage or getting the crew down safely. But in each case, officials here and at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida say, the proposed solution would not have worked.

The simplest would have been to abort the mission the moment the damage was discovered. In case of an engine malfunction or other serious problem at launching, a space shuttle can jettison its solid rocket boosters and the external fuel tank, shut down its own engines and glide back down, either returning to the Kennedy Space Center or an emergency landing site in Spain or Morocco.

But no one even knew that a piece of insulation from the external tank had hit the orbiter until a frame-by-frame review of videotape of the launching was undertaken the next day. By then, Columbia was already in orbit, and re-entry would have posed the same danger that it did 16 days later...

42 posted on 02/04/2003 10:11:51 PM PST by Screaming_Gerbil
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies ]


To: Screaming_Gerbil
I GET THE HINT!!!!! :)
48 posted on 02/04/2003 10:14:48 PM PST by Mitchel Tighe
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 42 | View Replies ]

To: Screaming_Gerbil
Are you trying to escape from Richard Gere or the FR server?

Just curious.
65 posted on 02/04/2003 10:27:32 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 42 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson