Posted on 01/28/2006 9:20:10 AM PST by nwrep
The shuttle broke up because of aerodynamic forces in the aftermath of the tank explosion. The crew cabin was torn free basically intact though it had lost pressurization. They did not wear pressure suits then so at that altitude they would have lost conciousness very quickly. Several emergency oxygen sources had been turned on, some of them were able to do this after the explosion. Those were not designed for high altitude use however. I dont know if oxygen makes much difference at that altitude anyways because there is no useful atmospheric pressure for lungs to work properly. Maybe someone can answer that.
The G-forces on them must have been extreme as well, that may have blacked them out, not sure on that. As they descended in free fall atmospheric pressure and oxygen would have increased, i dont know how quick someone regains conciousness in that quick a descent.
Todays astronauts wear pressure suits and have parachutes and a slide pole (so as not to hit the wing) to get out of the crew cabin. At least that would provide a fighting chance to get out. I often wonder if the Challneger crew had had that equipment, could they have gotten out somehow?
I think there is lots of info on the net out there on all this.
God I wish there was someway to change history. All we can do is learn from it. I dont beat NASA up as much for Columbia, they had 100+ flights and assumed they understood the foam issue. The sin of assumption is unforgiving in such endeavours. We are very new to space travel still. And we learn as much about human shortcomings as much as we learn about exploration when we dare great things.
Those words still move me.
The shuttle/external tank/solid rocket booster combination broke apart a few seconds before the propellants combusted. See the link in my post #37 for an explanation.
wow! that's an amazing story...
OMG! The president had a speech writer?!
i remember that it kept being postponed... i was a sophomore in college... i remember my mom telling me the night before that it might happen in the morning... when i awoke the next morning, i asked her if she knew if it was going to launch or if it had launched... she said it was still postponed... and then a little later she said, no--it was back on... and then disaster...
i cannot believe it's been 3 yrs. since Columbia...
i remember the face of Christa McAuliffe's mother... it seemed she didn't know what happened at first... how could she? it seems it took an eternity for the realization of what happened to sink in for everybody watching...
did he not speak the words?
So can I.
I was driving across the Sunshine Skyway in FL when it happened. I was trying to see the launch, which is usually visible from the Skyway if the weather is clear, when I suddenly saw the burst of white smoke from the explosion and then a forked trail of smoke forming in the bright blue sky over 100 miles away.
I knew instantly that something awful had happened to the shuttle, and I quickly tuned the radio to a Tampa news station and heard the tragic news being reported from the cape.
I guess that's one of those things that will always stick in a person's mind.
For me it was all three. I remember exactly the moment and place where I learned of each one of those tragedies. But the only one that I actually saw live as it happened was the Challenger explosion.
If I'm not mistaken, (which is entirely possible) Magee was an RAF fighter pilot who was killed when his Hawker Hurricane was shot down in the Battle of Britain.
Actually, he died in a training accident -- his plane collided with another one over England on December 11, 1941.
In a way, yes.
People speculated that NASA was pressured to launch in order for the President to be able to mention the teacher in his State of the Union address.
We need even more people to reach out to the kids like that. What an eloquent statement it was.
I think people in general have gotten more vicious since then. We need to stop trying to always blame the other guy and see what we can do ourselves to make society a little better.
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