Golf-Ball Sized Hail Damages Shuttle 118
MattSparkes writes "The Shuttles March launch has been delayed to late April after golf-ball sized hail caused 7000 pits and divots in the foam that shields the fuel tank. NASA say it's the worst damage of its kind that they have ever seen, but hail is not a new problem for the agency. In 1982, a hailstorm damaged the sensitive heat shield tiles on the Columbia's wings. The damaged tiles then absorbed about 540 kilograms of rain. Once in space, the orbiter faced the Sun to allow the tiles to dry out."
Heh, apparently hail ain't their only problem (Score:5, Interesting)
That got a bit of a chuckle; It's in the article linked from TFA.
Paradigm shift (Score:5, Interesting)
Rain (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe they should have invested (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Rain (Score:3, Interesting)
I wonder how much such a worthless payload costs in terms of fuel needs.
Would it not have been cheaper to dry the shuttle while on earth? and spare a couple of hundred liters of fuel?
Re:Paradigm shift (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Obviously (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm sure there are reasons why they don't, but can those reasons out-weigh the problems it's causing with the foam on the outside?
Does anyone know if this has been considered? If so, why hasn't it been done, yet? Please be as specific as you can. I'm really interested in this.