NASA Debates Second Discovery Repair 257
An anonymous reader writes "NASA is debating today whether or not they should attempt a second repair attempt of the Space Shuttle Discovery to repair a possible problem with the thermal blanket. On Wednesday, an astronaut removed two protruding cloth fillers from between the ceramic tiles on the space shuttle's heat shield. "I think in the old days we would not have worried about this so much," said shuttle programme deputy manager Wayne Hale The astronaut extended his gloved hand and quickly removed the first fiber strip, which was sticking up from Discovery's smooth, tiled underside. "It's coming out very easily," the astronaut said. Arm operator Jim Kelly then maneuvered the arm about three meters to the second protruding strip, known as a gap filler, and Robinson gently pulled that piece out as well. The concern now is whether or not a damaged thermal blanket under one of the cockpit windows would tear apart during re-entry and strike the orbiter."
Re:Overclockers.com? (Score:5, Interesting)
No, it's a pretty transparent attempt to bring readers to overclockers.com. The Slashdot editors should know better.
Re:Keep Pulling Till You Find Out. (Score:3, Interesting)
Those gap fillers came out when some guy pulled on them, you'd think the force of re-entry would have pushed them right back into place with no problem. By pulling it out they've left a gaping, but small, hole in their thermal protection system. I'm still convinced that they should have just left it alone, and that the orbiter's completely ready for re-entry.
Whatever they decide to do, I hope they hurry up and get it done, so that when they come back unscathed everyone can breathe easier.
Re:America's Obsession With Safety (Score:2, Interesting)
they're all chickens who've never flown, and the only risk they take is going to a race car rally or trying to step down from their monster trucks without breaking their ankles.
if you want real adventurers, you have to tune out those fear mongers, and live.
i've done more impossible things before breakfast than many, and find this Oh My Fricking G.. attitude to permeate those scaredy cats thinking. it's all they have, fear.
Real americans are made of sterner stuff than that. When we screw up, we deal with it and move on, we don't watch car crashes on the 6 o'clock news, cause we're busy scaling mountains for fun or surfing off Longpoint WA.
Re:This is the end of the road (Score:3, Interesting)
Technically, things may be going fantastically. It doesn't matter. The whole mission is about "Don't screw up! Don't screw up!" and every future mission will be "Don't screw up! Don't screw up!" until inevitably something does get screwed up. Every flight will consist of going into space to do the equivalent of refinishing a bathroom floor.
If NASA starts something new and ambitious with a clear, exciting goal -- the media and public will be able to accept risk the way they did with Mercury, Apollo and the early shuttle program. But sending people into space purely for the goal of not killing them? It's a dead end.
Re:You know what they say... (Score:3, Interesting)
There have been some close calls, but no serious accidents in the US program. During the 60's, a Soviet astronaut had problems getting back into the capsule and shutting the hatch, due to the pressuration in his suit. More recently, a problem with pressure in an oxygen bottle forced a spacewalk at the ISS to be aborted.
But, the risks aren't just to the spacewalker. Just moving around near the outside of the orbiter risks a collision that can cause more damage.
It seems like there have been more space walks than shuttle flights.
If you add up all the spacewalks since the 60's, I sure that there are more. However, the relative infrequency of these events doesn't provide enough samples to compare the risk on that basis alone.
Re:You know what they say... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:This is the end of the road (Score:3, Interesting)
The astronauts know it's not going to be easy. They know stuff's going to go wrong, and that they're going to have to fix it. The public (and occasionally the NASA administrators) are the ones that forget that there's always plenty of risk, and decide to occasionally make a bigger deal out of what happens than they should. The Challenger and Columbia accidents were unfortunate, no doubt. But you'd be foolish to expect that the human conquest of space would be without casualties. People still die driving to work every morning, and that gets done millions of times per day. Why should we get discouraged when a spacecraft blows up. Certainly, we should figure out what went wrong, and learn lessons from it. And we should definitely take any steps we can to protect astronauts. But a few unsuccessful missions hardly means the space program is a failure.
It's kind of weird actually. when you think about the people involved in the space program, how many of them do you think feel that space exploration should be stopped because it's too dangerous? Probably somewhere around 0%. The astronauts know the risks. The engineers know the risks.
How many politicians think it's too dangerous? I'd guess not many. They know the astronauts are volunteers. They understand that space program has scientific value, and also acts as a good inspiration for national pride. Not to mention jobs.
Now how many members of the public think it should be shut down due to the dangers? Again, I think that number would be rather small. How many people died on Columbia? Seven? How many people die every day for reasons way more pointless and interesting than space exploration? I'm thinking that the public at large supports the space program.
Yet when everyone comes together as a nation, we turn into a bunch of sissies, horribly worried that something might go wrong. I just don't understand where the fear comes from, and why it's so debilitating to the space program.
Re:This is the end of the road (Score:3, Interesting)
SafeSimpleSoon.Com [safesimplesoon.com], for example, has tons of info on an idea that looks likely to work. You don't cancel one idea because you don't like it before the next is ready, though. You go through transition first, and the transition is just starting right now.
Put the saftey effort elsewhere (Score:3, Interesting)
The rather large hole in Columbia's wing did doom the mission and should have prompted an abort to land, or at least a repair attempt of some sort if no rescue could be attempted, even if it was just stuffing pieces of a spacesuit in the hole.
My point is, we didn't image the huge damage, but now we are being way to cautious with every nick and ding we are seeing in exquisite detail that were probably there in similar degrees on every previous mission. Am I the only one worried they are going to break something critical trying to fix these minor problems? It wasn't some minor airflow problem over Columbia that doomed the mission, but a gapping hole.
On a related note, it does seem that more debris is falling of the external tank than ever before. One reason for the increase shedding was explained as a change in fabrication techniques for the foam using ozone safe chemicals. This being speculated in the wake of loosing Columbia. Have we gone back to the older fab technique, or are the few shuttle launches a year just too much of a strain on the environment? Seriously, I support the replacement of dangerous CFCs, but only in situations where they don't endanger life. What percent of ozone depletion could the foam on the Shuttle possible represent?
Seems like NASA should concentrate on first causes, not this piddling after the fact stuff.
Ok is it just me? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:You know what they say... (Score:5, Interesting)
To be fair that was during the first space walk. Ever. The Russians didn't let the rest of the world know about the problems encountered though -- including that he had to drop the suit pressure below the minimum safety level in order to get back in.
It's only been since the fall of the Soviet Union that a lot of the problems of the Soviet space program have come to light.
Re:The one piece of equipment to make ISS usefull. (Score:2, Interesting)
As I understand it, the CRV would cost something like 3 billion dollars to develop. I would imagine that, for less money, we could redesign the docking adapters to support two Soyuz capsules. Let's say that costs a billion dollars. Two Soyuz will hold six people, so that's what we limit the space station crew to.
Buy six Soyuz capsules at 100 million dollars each. Send them up and attach them to the new docking capsules. Presto! Lifeboats for half the cost. You also have more redundancy, which is always good in lifeboats. For that matter, you have some advantages. Suppose one of your crew gets injured. Toss him in a Soyuz capsule with a buddy and send them down. You still have 5 capsules left for everybody else.
Another idea is to do a competitive bid. The "space lifeboat" must have the following capabilities:
- It must be able to survive exposure to space for 1 year -- For budgeting purposes, it must be at least one year (so "replacing lifeboats" can be conveniently budgeted). Obviously, more years is better.
- It must be able to support a crew of 7 for 6 hours -- Again, the number of hours is arbitrary.
- It must be able to land anywhere -- Water or ground, it shouldn't matter. When you're trying to get away from a dangerous situation, the last thing you want to do is to have to wait for a "return window." If it lands in water, it should be able to float for at least ten minutes. Ideally, longer, but if one person can't open a self-inflating lifeboat and dump 6 unconscious colleagues into the raft in under ten minutes, they've got bigger problems.
There are somewhat more mundane things (strength of chairs etc.) that would have to be specced. But, again, it's a freaking lifeboat! It should cost nowhere near 3 billion dollars. Put it out to a world-wide competitive bid (after all, it is the International Space Station) and see what people come back with. Sit down with a calculator and figure out which bid will be cheapest over five years (Cost of each lifeboat times number of lifeboats times years). Give bonus points to craft which exceed specifications (eg, can support a crew of 7 for 12 hours, can float for two hours, etc.). Pick the best one. Give them the contract for five years. In four years, start the process all over again.I mean, this isn't rocket science...