Space Shuttle Fleet Grounded!

NASA sources | MB26

[MindBender26]

NASA realizes debris that fell of external fuel tank yesterday came close to causing irrepairable damage to shuttle now in orbit.

Fleet GROUNDED. More later

Chances to return to flight again, no better than 50/50.

[al baby]

note to self read all posts first

[FReepaholic]

...they might have to head for the I.S.S...

They already are.

...or set it on a course to the sun...

No can do. Can't achieve the necessary escape velocity.

If it's abandoned, it will eventually return to Earth.

[monkapotamus]

"I think this is the end of the Shuttle, but not manned space flight"

I agree. This setback will accelerate the development of something better - it will be matter of pride too.

[djf]

Well, I asked a question, and somebody asked me to name a source.

If I had stated something I thought was factual, I could give a source.

If I were to say "How many cows jumped over the moon?", am I reasonably expected to name a source?

It made no sense.

[GRRRRR]

Yeah but what is its "R" insulation value????

[GRRRRR]

PS--THIS is Nasa OVER-Reacting...seriously.

[Right Wing Assault]

Haven't we learned that abstinence is 100 percent safe?

Ooh! So I guess a giant condom over the tank wouldn't be 100%. Darn! I was just drawing up the specs for it. What a bunch of endorsements that could have meant.

[Cboldt]

Why does everyone think I need to learn HTML? I had a six meg website with over 200 pages for years.

LOL. Was gonna make a smart-aleck answer, but figure it's as likely to mistaken for serious.

[hattend]

No need to explain, I was just answering your question...the first one out of context.

No big deal.

[Bogey78O]

Michoud just can't get a break.

Screw it. Let's build something else.

[glock rocks]

Maybe they'll let Uncle Ben paint an ad on the side.

City Wok!

[Kevin OMalley]

I guess I must have missed something. What was it?

[numberonepal]

NASA has been trying to figure this out for the past 2 1/2 years, to no avail.

Shoulda built the dang thing out of titanium to begin with.

[delacoert]

I don't know how you all are getting the 1-2% loss rate.

There have been five spaceworthy space shuttles (Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavor) and two have been lost. That's an equipment loss rate of 40%.

I think this latest mission is the 26th mission of the space shuttle program. The two losses result in a ~4% mission loss rate.

[al baby]

see this post

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1451862/posts?page=229#229

[Milwaukee_Guy]

"Why use the phrase "grounded"? It's not like they are planning more launches while Discovery is up there!"

IIRC There -is- a backup shuttle ready to bring the current crew home from the ISS if the current shuttle has tile damage which would preclude a safe return. Right now there is concern about detached tiles near the front landing gear doors. Until a complete inspection is made there is the potential to discover other tile loss/damage over the next few days.

The backup shuttle would need about 35 days to be made ready for launch. Provisions on the ISS would sustain the ISS crew and the marooned current shuttle crew for about 45 days.

Only a 10 day buffer period.

The news today about -grounding- the balance of the shuttle fleet raises very serious implications for any sort of rescue mission to the ISS.

Remember the "escape pod" for the ISS is a exist Soyuz capsule which can hold only three people. The Soyuz escape capsule was designed only to evacuate a three man ISS crew.

Pray for a safe outcome......

[Right Wing Assault]

Is it raining?

No.

What's your source?

[MinorityRepublican]

If the situation is this serious, and there is the slightest chance that Discovery might be unable to make a safe re-entry, they might have to head for the I.S.S., hole up there until a Russian flight can bring them back, and ditch Discovery either in orbit until it can be retrieved, or set it on a course to the sun, where it will be burn up.

There's one thing that I don't get. At this point, it appears that the Russians may have a better space program than us. Apparently, it seems like their rockets are more dependable than ours. What's up with that?

[numberonepal]

The Earth worshippers killed our astronauts.

If you break it down objectively I'd bet dollars to donuts watermelons and greenies have contributed to deaths on the order of Pol Pot or the Nazis.

[FreedomCalls]

If we did that in commercial aircraft world airline tickets would cost a million dollars each.

It costs a heck of a lot more than a million dollars per shuttle passenger. A million dollars will buy you about 10 ponds of cargo.

That level of incompetence in NASA's engineering management is truly astounding.

It's NASA's management overall that is incompetent not just its engineering section. They would much rather sit on their butts for 2 1/2 years rather than actually doing something -- like launching vehicles into space.