Space Shuttle Columbia Breaks Up Over Texas 2398
An anonymous reader writes "NASA lost communication with space shuttle Columbia shortly before its scheduled landing on Saturday. It was unclear whether there were any other problems." Various news programs have been showing debris falling from the sky, and NASA has declared an emergency.Update: 02/01 15:29 GMT by H : Confirmation has come - the shuttle has broken up over Texas while coming in for landing Florida.
God rest their souls (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:God rest their souls - Here is the Crew profile (Score:4, Informative)
Re:God rest their souls (Score:5, Insightful)
We need to build new shuttles for the 21st century (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:God rest their souls (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: $DEITY rest their souls (Score:5, Interesting)
Which is exactly what I was asking myself when the Challenger exploded.
Re:No doubt! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:God rest their souls (Score:4, Insightful)
Idiot. Do you know why they are called children? Why they are considered dependents? Why kids cannot vote, why they can't drink, why they can't agree to contracts?
Because children are not mentally nor emotionally capable of handling the grim realities pumped out by the media. The job of the parents is to protect children from these horrid images until those kids are mature enough to understand. It is the job of the parents to shelter the kids from the harsh realities of life. To take the raw data and figure out how to put it into terms that the kid can 1. understand and 2. not scar them mentally or emotionally.
If you want to fuck your own kids up, that's fine, but don't tell other parents how to raise their own kids.
Re:God rest their souls (Score:5, Insightful)
You know what, I'll just go ahead and say what I've been wanting to say for AGES about manned space flight. It's fucking dangerous. It's one of the most dangerous operations that any human can be involved with. No amount of investigation, upgrading, efficiency, or what not is going to change that basic nature of the equation. The energy involved at certain critical points (launch, reentry) is of such a high order that it simply isn't feasibly to introduce life-saving components. When something occurs at such critical points (which of course, is when it is most likely that something WILL go wrong), everyone is going to die. Period.
The Russian and US space programs have known this for ages, but the US public just doesn't want to accept the fact that their are serious risks involved with putting human beings in orbit and getting them home safely. The complexity of the systems required to do such is of such an order of magnitude that it's just impossible to create any orbital delivery system that is completely failsafe.
This isn't, by any account, to say that NASA shouldn't attempt to figure out what happened and prevent it from happening in the future. Of course they should, that's their job. But to expect that accidents will never occur is naive beyond reason.
We need to either accept the inherent risks or quit putting people in orbit.
An eerie warning from a year and half ago (Score:5, Informative)
WASHINGTON -- Raising the specter of another shuttle tragedy, senators and others warned Thursday that NASA's growing budget woes are putting astronauts' lives at risk.
Pressure to deal with a projected $4.8 billion cost overrun on the International Space Station project and other factors have caused National Aeronautics and Space Administration managers to treat space shuttle safety upgrades as optional, officials said Thursday. Numerous pending safety improvements to the orbiter vehicles and their ground-support infrastructure have been targeted for cancellation or deferral.
"I fear that if we don't provide the space shuttle program with the resources it needs for safety upgrades, our country is going to pay a price we can't bear," said Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla.
[...]
"We're starving NASA's shuttle budget and thus greatly increasing the chance of a catastrophic loss," Nelson said.
The lone NASA official to testify, William Readdy, deputy associate administrator for the Office of Space Flight, did not dispute Nelson's assessment.
Re:God rest their souls (Score:5, Interesting)
And ironic that it happens 36 years (and a couple of days) after the Apollo 1 tragedy.
NASA site mission STS-107 (Score:5, Informative)
Re:NASA site mission STS-107 (Score:4, Insightful)
I for one want to see a Moon colony, Mars colony, etc.
We aren't going to get off this rock if we only send robots into space.
More links and info (Score:5, Informative)
The U.S. Space Shuttle Columbia, flying STS 107 [nasa.gov] apparently dissentegrated over north Texas during re-entry according to CNN [cnn.com], CBS [cbsnews.com], and NBC [msnbc.com] TV reports. Columbia launched on January 16 for that orbiter's 28th journey. Communication was lost at 8:00 Central Time (14:00 GMT), 16 minutes prior to the scheduled landing, at an altitude of 200,000 feet (61km) and velocity of 12,000 miles per hour (19,000 km/h). NASA advises people to report and avoid debris in the area because it may inlude toxic propellants.
Toxic Substances (Score:4, Informative)
Under normal circumstances, the shuttle is checked and astronauts don't leave for a good 15 to 30 minutes after the shuttle has landed.
End of Nuclear power in space.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:End of Nuclear power in space.... (Score:5, Interesting)
As evidence that the project will continue, I refer to this PopSci article:
"The New War in Space"
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/aviation/art
Not because PopSci is really the definitive source on such issues, but because it contains some quotes from Rumsfeld about his (hence, the administration's) intent to "weaponize" space, and some analysis thereof.
The choice quote, which I can't track down at the moment, is something like "All media (land, sea, air) have been used for combat, and it's unrealistic to think space will be any different." Unfortunately, I doubt the administration will be dissuaded by the deaths of 7 astronauts, or the broader implications of this tragedy relative to the safety of sending *anything* into space.
Too high and too fast for missiles... (Score:5, Insightful)
at an altitude of 200,000 feet (61km) and velocity of 12,000 miles per hour (19,000 km/h)
That makes terrorism highly unlikely. That's too high and too fast for much of anything to hit it. It's more like a ballistic missile than an airplane at that point, and we all know how well the Star Wars project is faring [sky.com].
Photos (Score:5, Informative)
www.pdrap.org [pdrap.org], link from the front page.
The actual photo page is here [pdrap.org]
I didn't actually see the space shuttle until it had exploded, so all my photos are of the shuttle as it burns and breaks up. The instant that the shuttle exploded was dramatic. One second I'm looking for it, the next, it was a bright burning ball of fire.
Very sad. Columbia was my favorite shuttle.
Re:Photos (Score:5, Informative)
http://sage.che.pitt.edu/~harrold/tmp/shuttle/www
it's going to be a while though.
Re:Photos (Score:5, Insightful)
Calm down. It's called the freedom of speech. People can say insensitive things and they're allowed to do so, it's the great thing about the US.
And, please, what makes this any more sad than 7 people dying on the streets tonight? What makes this any more important than the prospect of hundreds of thousands of people dying in a forthcoming war?
This is a sad event, and will rock the nation, but still.. it's 7 people. If Bush has his way, thousands more will be dead soon, and I bet you won't be crying into your hankies then.
And because I believe in these rights to free speech, I'm not hiding behind the Anonymous Coward either.
This is terrible (Score:5, Insightful)
But once we are done with the grief and morning for these great people, the space program will be severely hampered from further progress. We need this program to continue, and I'm afraid we've just killed it for twenty years.
Very sad all around.
Re:This is terrible (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe it is not so bad for the space program itself. It was the first failure of the Apollo mission that sparked NASA's motivation, and inherent success, thereafter, I believe. The results of this, although acutely tragic, could certainly bring about renewed motiviation. If that is the case, then at least this loss will not have been in vain.
Re:This is terrible (Score:4, Insightful)
If the money spent on the ISS and the shuttle was diverted to projects like the Pathfinder, we'd have robots sampling Europa's oceans within the decade. Why risk human lives and billions of dollars on lower orbit?
Re:This is terrible (Score:4, Insightful)
Why keep putting humans into space?
If we can develop the technique of moving Life into Space, we can better manage the resources of this planet.
Being able to keep a Human alive in space is kinda like trying to grow massive crops of useful resources - corn, weed, etc.
If we can master this, we can stop raping Earth.
Imagine if we moved all of our heavy, dangerous, high-pollutant based industry to a place in space where super-dangerous materials of Earth magnitude are puny compared to what's natively there
Not to mention delivery is just a drop away.
It's cheap to move shit in Space, once you get up there and work it out!
A lot cheaper than here on Earth.
Face it, Space won't happen until we make it valuable, and the intrinsic values are too numerous to imagine right now.
We get more from looking at things directly, sometimes - or at least being close to the things we're looking at - than the devices we use to look in our place.
A good way to get the tech we need to actually put Life into Space, is simply to accept the challenge - and defeat it - of putting Human Beings happily in Space, able to survive.
Re:This is terrible (Score:4, Insightful)
Not because this in itself is a goal, but because it is an essential ingredient for a future with a world we might actually someday be proud of.
Re:This is terrible (Score:4, Insightful)
Astronautical research created the way our world works, and saves lives in the air and on the ground daily.
Re:This is terrible (Score:5, Insightful)
This is end of the a manned space program, at least for the short-term.
I totally agree with this, but now NASA will be in a VERY tough spot. ISS's Expedition Six crew which went up in November I think are scheduled to return sometime in April or May. I couldn't imagine NASA ungrounding the shuttle fleet by then.. This brings about a whole round of questions... How long CAN the Expedition Six crew stay on the ISS? Can the Russian space program possibly return the astronauts to earth? Will NASA be forced to temporarily unground one shuttle for the mission, keeping everyone on pins and needles during the entire flight? This is a say day for NASA, space exploration, and humandkind in general.
Shayne
Re:This is terrible (Score:5, Informative)
I think this will actually help Russia's space program; unless we want to close up the ISS and come home, Nasa is going to throw some big bucks Russia's way... They now have the only vehicle that can get to and from the ISS, at least as long as the shuttle is grounded.
BBCTV and NASA TV (Score:5, Informative)
BBC news live (needs Real/Helix player)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/live/now2.ram [bbc.co.uk]
Story
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/2716369.stm [bbc.co.uk]
NASA TV Live (Real/Helix Player)
http://quest.nasa.gov/ltc/ram/nasalive-v.ram [nasa.gov]
Don't Panic (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry to lose the crew and shuttle. But I hope we don't suddenly halt the manned space program like we did after Challenger.
Space exploration is a dangerous undertaking, and every astronaut is taking a huge risk every time they go up. We have to expect casualties, we've been very lucky throughout the history of the US space program. Not to minimize the loss of the crew, they're heroes, but we can't stop the program because of this. Surely investigation, but not a halt.
Say a prayer for the crew, if you believe in such stuff.
Now we have a stranded ISS crew... (Score:4, Interesting)
What are the chances NASA will send up STS 108 on schedule?
Will they use the soyuz emergency capsule to return earthside?
ISS crews usually use Soyuz, not Shuttles (Score:4, Informative)
Yes.
What are the chances NASA will send up STS 108 on schedule?
Zero. I wouldn't be surprised if the shuttles never fly again.
Will they use the soyuz emergency capsule to return earthside?
Unlikely. Remember, the Soyuz is not just an emergency capsule, it's a full-blown launcher system. Most supply and crew change missions to the ISS are flown with Soyuzes, so technically the shuttle is not an irreplaceable part of the ISS program.
However, Russia's financially strapped space program has been hard pressed to produce even the current number of spacecraft (the "escape capsule" Soyuz is swapped for a new one every 6 months), so whether they alone can keep going is doubtful.
-j.
Several Comments (Score:5, Informative)
2. There is almost no fuel on the space shuttle during reentry.
3. Most likely cause of destruction was damage to heat shield.
4. Survival is possible... space shuttle was relatively slow, already mostly throught the atmosphere the crew may have been able to bail out, and they do have parachutes.
5. This does not bode well for manned space exploration
Re:Several Comments (Score:5, Informative)
True of shoulder launched missiles, but I'm not so sure about things like the Aegis SM2's, or fighter launched air-to-air missiles. However, it's safe to say, it's very very unlikely it's a missile.
2. There is almost no fuel on the space shuttle during reentry.
Compared to the main tank, true. But they use thruster rockets right down to the point they drop subsonic, and these thrusters use hypergolic (self igniting) fuels.
4. Survival is possible... space shuttle was relatively slow, already mostly throught the atmosphere the crew may have been able to bail out, and they do have parachutes.
Not at 200,000 feet. Entry interface is at 400,000 feet. Region of maxiumum heating is at 43 miles up, or 227,040 feet. At that point, they're still doing 15,000 miles per hour. They exit ionization blackout 12 minutes before touchdown, still doing 8200 miles per hour. Surviving egress from an aircraft above Mach 1 is dangerous. Above Mach 3, pretty much not surviveable, unless you have some kind of armored escape pod.
5. This does not bode well for manned space exploration
Agreed. I think we need to replace the shuttle system. It's 30 year old technology.
Temkin
Freaky (Score:5, Interesting)
Timestamped report from Spaceflight Now (Score:5, Informative)
Not funny in any way (Score:5, Funny)
If the posts so far are any indication of the number of Genuine Assholes who frequent this site, it's a lost cause anyway.
This is not funny in any way.
Re:Not funny in any way (Score:5, Insightful)
Broken tile, not terrorism...? (Score:5, Insightful)
But the damage has been done: the astronauts are dead, and the U.S. space program -- which never recovered from Challenger's loss -- may soon be dead as well.
-j.
fuckfuckfuck Not again! (Score:4, Insightful)
They are/were brave people who have created and flown in the Shuttle, but it is time to replace and retire the bird. Please presure your elected representatives to fund a new spacecraft so that we can have a safer vehicle to take us into space.
ttyl
Farrell
Some More Info (speculation) (Score:5, Informative)
Part of the insulation on one of the boosters apparently came off on takoff (gaining orbit) and struck a wing. The wing was checked during flight and said to not be damaged.
This is terrible... (Score:5, Insightful)
You also may not remember the emptiness when it became clear that NASA with public and short-sighted government pressure was shying away from manned space flight, and there was so much fear that it may never recover. This was a tragedy of epic proportions -- the possibility that we in the US (and as one of the major players in manned space flight) might shy away from exploration and adventure because it was dangerous.
Things truely never recovered. The idiocy that is the Interational Space Station is a direct descendant of those events 17 years ago (almost to the day). The loss of our looking outward at greater feats, better manned spacecraft and the like are all descendant from that instant.
Now we stand at the cusp of it happening again. This depresses me. People today just don't understand that taking risks is important to advancement, and death is part of taking risks... something explorers have understood for centuries, and a lot of people have seemed to have forgotten today.
While part of me thinks NASA getting out of the manned space business, and dumping this massive waste of energy going into the ISS would be a good thing, because it may open up that exploration and adventure to those goverments or business who still have that sense of longing. I'm scared, though, that no one else will step up and take the reigns.
I hope we as a nation can recognize this for what it was -- an unfortunate event, but an outcome that can be expected when pushing the boundaries. We should feel pride in the people who lost their lives here, and rise up, and continue to do what they gave their lives for. I hope we as Americans don't shrink away even more in fear.
As potentially unpatriotic as it is to say, it makes me glad to know that the hope, energy and imagination of the billion people in China are there to step up, if we turn our backs on this important step in Humanity's future. It matters far more to me that we do this as a species then we do it as a nation. I hate the thought of what losing this would be a sign of for us as a country, though.
Magellan - death is part of taking risks (Score:5, Insightful)
What would have happened if exploration had been written off as "too risky" after that? I guess those of us here in the New World (at least, those of European descent) are lucky that our ancestors were greedy enough to continue onwards despite those risks.
High Flight (Score:5, Insightful)
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds...and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of...wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
'High Flight' by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.
I wept in 1986 as a child, now I do it again as a man. Goodbye and Godspeed...
- Necron69
You reminded me of Robert Heinlein (Score:4, Insightful)
Let the sweet fresh breezes heal me
As they rove around the girth
Of our lovely mother planet
Of the cool, green hills of Earth.
We rot in the moulds of Venus,
We retch at her tainted breath.
Foul are her flooded jungles,
Crawling with unclean death.
[ --- the harsh bright soil of Luna ---
--- Saturn's rainbow rings ---
--- the frozen night of Titan --- ]
We've tried each spinning space mote
And reckoned its true worth:
Take us back again to the homes of men
On the cool, green hills of Earth.
The arching sky is calling
Spacemen back to their trade.
ALL HANDS! STAND BY! FREE FALLING!
And the lights below us fade.
Out ride the sons of Terra,
Far drives the thundering jet,
Up leaps a race of Earthmen,
Out, far, and onward yet ---
We pray for one last landing
On the globe that gave us birth;
Let us rest our eyes on the friendly skies
And the cool, green hills of Earth.
-- Robert A. Heinlein
The seven astronauts were explorers and would have understood, even though there was always a chance they wouldn't get their 'last landing' they did what they had to do. Others will take their place, the 'arching sky' will always be calling us, there's too much still unknown to give up now.
Looks like Feynmann was right :( (Score:5, Interesting)
Challenger was flight STS-51L - this was flight STS-107. I'd say even Feynmann may have been somewhat optimistic (although 2 failures is a thin data set - anyone want to figure a chi-square on it?).
Re:Looks like Feynmann was right :( (Score:5, Informative)
Feynmann was very unhappy with the report on the Challenger disaster. As a member of the committee responsible for the report he refused to sign off on it unless he could include his views on shuttle safety as an appendix. As another /. reader pointed out previously, you can read Feynmann's appendix here [nasa.gov]:
http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/missions/51-l/ docs/rogers-commission/Appendix-F.txt
Down near the end of the appendix Feynmann places the odds of catastrophic failure for a shuttle to be "on the order of 1%". This does NOT mean he said it was 1%: when a physicist says "on the order of" he means "the same order of magnitude" or (for the less mathematically rigorous) "about the same power of 10 as". He even went on to apologize for being unable to be more specific.
So, Feynmann's estimate was really that the chance of failure is CLOSER TO 1 IN 100 than to 1 in a thousand or 1 in 10.
NOAA Radar (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:NOAA Radar (Score:4, Informative)
Shuttle, Gliding, x-plane, and a theory (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.x-plane.com/orbiter.html
x-plane is an amazing flight simulator that uses an amazingly realistic flight model - great "physics" in video game software speak - and can simulate shuttle landings. The shuttle is a glider. I'm a glider pilot, but certainly not anything like a shuttle pilot
The shuttle changes its bank during the phase of the landing it was in to reduce speed. It's not banking to try change its course, it banks to increase drag and reduce speed. The shuttle just rotates over oneo its left or right side a bit.
The shuttle switches back and forth from banking right to banking left to stay on course while performing these drag increasing maneuvers.
FYI, these maneuvers are also done with the shuttle at a very steep angle of attack - as high as 70 degrees. This angle is also used to increase drag to slow the shuttle down.
The last confirmed communication happened shortly after the shuttle made its first switch from being banked right to being banked left.
It is very possible that the switch to being banked left introduced a change in force which led to a structural failure of the wings or control surfaces which are used during the landing. Given the high drag, high angle of attack, banked flight angle the orbiter would be in at the time, the shuttle would almost immediately start spinning end over end at 12,000 mph, disintegrating almost instantly.
Nasa also reported that one of the last data events they received from the shuttle was a "loss in tire pressure". It's alternatively possible that this could happen after an internal explosion in the shuttle, with part of the explosion debris puncturing the tire.
Below is a chronology from spaceflightnow.com - Notice the change in bank angle time.
1401 GMT (9:01 a.m. EST)
Columbia is out of communications with flight controllers in Houston. Now 15 minutes from landing time.
1359 GMT (8:59 a.m. EST)
At an altitude of 40 miles, shuttle Columbia has entered Texas.
1357 GMT (8:57 a.m. EST)
The shuttle is now 43 miles over New Mexico. Columbia is now reversing its bank to the left to further reduce speed.
Just to pre-empt a few arguments before they start (Score:5, Informative)
1) As has been mentioned, there was no missle fired that could hit 200,000 feet. Iraq may have built a "supergun" with the capability to launch objects into space, but a) its firing would have been pretty obvious and b) the odds of it hitting its target are about zero, while the chance of its discovery was absolute. So no -- this wasn't a surface-to-air attack.
2) Neither was it some kind of EMP pulse. Ignoring the height, this is a ship that needs to be able to survive the extraordinarily hostile EMP environment of space -- that magnetic field that the sun's particles slam into, giving us those nice Auroras, don't exist where the shuttle goes. The ship was built to withstand EMP -- the odds of a remotely invoked meltdown in its electronics are effectively nil.
3) No, they couldn't have known it was going to fail. Random crap happens all the time, even small tiles of foam coming off. The ships are built to be four-times redundant; you don't want your ship falling apart if a simple tile comes off. I'd be surprised if this had anything to do with the insulation stripping off.
4) No, the space program is not going to be shut down. To be blunt, China ain't going anywhere but up, and with an entirely fresh, completely modern space program at that. This is a tragedy. This is horrifying. But there will be future missions.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go mourn now.
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com
Dates in US space tragedy (Score:5, Informative)
Jan 28, 1986: Challenger explosion [fas.org]
Feb 1, 2003 Columbia breakup [cnn.com]
--LP
Reagan's day-of Challenger speech (Score:5, Insightful)
President Reagan's Speech on The Challenger Disaster
Oval Office of the White House
January 28, 1986
Ladies and Gentlemen, I'd planned to speak to you tonight to report on the state of the Union, but the events of earlier today have led me to change those plans. Today is a day for mourning and remembering. Nancy and I are pained to the core by the tragedy of the shuttle Challenger. We know we share this pain with all of the people of our country. This is truly a national loss.
Nineteen years ago, almost to the day, we lost three astronauts in a terrible accident on the ground. But, we've never lost an astronaut in flight; we've never had a tragedy like this. And perhaps we've forgotten the courage it took for the crew of the shuttle; but they, the Challenger Seven, were aware of the dangers, but overcame them and did their jobs brilliantly. We mourn seven heroes: Michael Smith, Dick Scobee, Judith Resnik, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Gregory Jarvis, and Christa McAuliffe. We mourn their loss as a nation together.
For the families of the seven, we cannot bear, as you do, the full impact of this tragedy. But we feel the loss, and we're thinking about you so very much. Your loved ones were daring and brave, and they had that special grace, that special spirit that says, 'Give me a challenge and I'll meet it with joy.' They had a hunger to explore the universe and discover its truths. They wished to serve, and they did. They served all of us.
We've grown used to wonders in this century. It's hard to dazzle us. But for twenty-five years the United States space program has been doing just that. We've grown used to the idea of space, and perhaps we forget that we've only just begun. We're still pioneers. They, the members of the Challenger crew, were pioneers.
And I want to say something to the schoolchildren of America who were watching the live coverage of the shuttle's takeoff. I know it is hard to understand, but sometimes painful things like this happen. It's all part of the process of exploration and discovery. It's all part of taking a chance and expanding man's horizons. The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave. The Challenger crew was pulling us into the future, and we'll continue to follow them...
I've always had great faith in and respect for our space program, and what happened today does nothing to diminish it. We don't hide our space program. We don't keep secrets and cover things up. We do it all up front and in public. That's the way freedom is, and we wouldn't change it for a minute. We'll continue our quest in space. There will be more shuttle flights and more shuttle crews and, yes, more volunteers, more civilians, more teachers in space. Nothing ends here; our hopes and our journeys continue. I want to add that I wish I could talk to every man and woman who works for NASA or who worked on this mission and tell them: "Your dedication and professionalism have moved and impressed us for decades. And we know of your anguish. We share it."
There's a coincidence today. On this day 390 years ago, the great explorer Sir Francis Drake died aboard ship off the coast of Panama. In his lifetime the great frontiers were the oceans, and a historian later said, 'He lived by the sea, died on it, and was buried in it.' Well, today we can say of the Challenger crew: Their dedication was, like Drake's, complete.
The crew of the space shuttle Challenger honoured us by the manner in which they lived their lives. We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for the journey and waved goodbye and 'slipped the surly bonds of earth' to 'touch the face of God.'
Exploration & Risks - Magellan (Score:5, Insightful)
What would have happened if exploration had been written off as "too risky" after that? I guess those of us here in the New World (at least, those of us of European descent) are lucky that our ancestors were greedy enough to continue onwards despite those risks.
Politics... (Score:5, Insightful)
So talk to your friends, tell them why space flight is important, and even more importantly, tell your congressmen what you think. They are the ones that control the money going into the space program. If nobody lets them know that we want space flight to continue, we might lose it entirely.
bring back the VentureStar (Score:5, Informative)
Check out the milnet page on VentureStar, which is apparently being funded by black-budget ops (speculation -- but something is happening, the Air Force doesn't warehouse dead NASA projects out of the goodness of its heart). Link here [216.239.37.100]
Had to pull the page from the Google cache, as much of the X-33/VentureStar info has disappeared from the web. But there's still plenty of stuff from non-governmental sites.
One of the X-33 design goals was to reduce cost per pound of payload from $20,000 to $2000, but in my mind, the more efficient and reliable engines, lack of strap-on boosters, slower reentry, no ceramic "bricks" for heat protection make good enough reasons to move forward with such a replacement for the shuttle, even if it had zero cost advantage in lifting payload to orbit.
There's no good reason to continue using the obsolete and dangerous shuttle technology forever.
It should also be noted... (Score:5, Interesting)
Interesting facts aside, this is a terrible tragedy. After an appropriate period of introspection and mourning, I hope that our government has the foresight to use this as the impetus to rethink the space program from the ground up, and reinvest in the types of endeavors that made the U.S. recognized leaders in the advancement of science and human exploration in the 1960s. It is time for NASA to be completely redesigned, and a new human space initiative begun with the bold, risk-taking nature that Americans have always been known for.
Unfortunately, our current governemnt is led by what is most likely the most short-sighted administration of the past 100 years. The chances of this President using this tragedy constructively as a catalyst for postive change are about the same as one of the Shuttle astronauts phoning in from a payphone in East Texas.
Silver lining? (Score:5, Insightful)
Fly
Unbelievable (Score:5, Informative)
I ruled out any problems with the house and went online hoping maybe to find seismic information or news about an explosion or something. Within a few minutes, I saw the alert on CNN.com suggesting they'd lost contact with Columbia. I instantly knew that's what the rumbling was and I started to fear the worst.
It's not terribly uncommon to hear sonic booms when the shuttle goes over (we seem to be in the path when the shuttles land at Cape Canaveral) but it also isn't uncommon to have low flying B-52s and B-2s. Needless to say, this is a horrible tragedy. Personally though, it's one thing to see it on TV. It's quite another to have it take place in your back yard.
CBS Is reporting possible failure of left wing (Score:4, Informative)
Again, this is only prelim reporting but would make sense in relation to visual reports of spiraling etc. Wing failure, goes into a spin, breaks up.
An Engineer's view on the first flights... (Score:5, Informative)
Here we get plenty of gritty details, in particular all the technical problems that they had during flights, and there were plenty. The well publicised Apolo 13 was only one of them, as virtually every mission was riddled with loss of control, loss of comunication, targetting error, or even worse, like rocket misfire on the pad with astronauts on top ! Just to show how close they were many times from major failure. Today was just one step over the limit.
A very recommended read for all you engineering types. And the others.
Remember Gus Grissom's words (Score:5, Insightful)
- Gus Grissom, responding to a reporter, at a press conference for the first manned Apollo mission.
Some of the last images of the astronauts (Score:5, Interesting)
Space.com has a series of pictures [space.com] put together with captions that were taken during the past 2 weeks on board the shuttle.
You can also find a copy of the mission patch and an explanation at spaceflight.nasa.gov (don't remember the direct link, sorry).
They should launch again as soon as possible (Score:4, Insightful)
Similairly when a person in skydiving has a near death event, it's also typical that they immediately go back up and do another skydive as soon as they're able to. It's kind of a cliche, but "getting back on the horse" is an important part of life. When people don't go back up, it's not uncommon for them to leave the sport entirely, ie. give in to their fears.
Space travel is dangerous, and shit's gonna happen. No matter what decisions are made, how safe you play the game, eventually somewhere somehow something bad will go wrong and with the dangers and forces involved with space travel that will usually mean people will die.
But that should not cause any interruptions in the space program. Just because a shuttle went down doesn't make them unsafe. In fact considering how often they go up, I'd say 1 shuttle down every 18 years is pretty damn good. NASA needs to get another shuttle up and get back on the horse ASAP.
Unfortunately what will probably happen is that the space program will be suspended while everyone plays the blame game. Fingers will be pointed, a lot of If's will be thrown around: If they hadn't dismissed the damage done to the wing at launch - If they had rehauled the shuttle more carefully in '99 - If more money was spent on the program - If we weren't using 20 year old technology - If, if, if...
If you skydive long enough, you'll see people die. The forces are extreme enough in the sport, that small mistakes can become lethal. Space travel involves forces even more extreme: here we had a craft screaming through re-entry into earth at 12,000 miles per hour. I can't begin to imagine the kind of stresses those forces put on a space craft.
Eventually the odds are going to catch up with those involved, something nobody thought of will happen and with such extreme forces involved, people will die.
But death doesn't mean you put all life on hold.
When you push the limits of human experience, the price is risk. But life without risk is meaningless.
Support ISS with Russian crafts (Score:5, Interesting)
This would mean the construction activity is halted (Shuttles were to deliver most/all new modules), but at least the station can be operated in its current configurations for the time being.
I view the dual delivery systems (STS + Russian crafts) as a partial redundancy built into the ISS program. Don't we now have the exact case when this redundancy should be used?
Any knowledgeable person to comment?
Will we ever learn... (Score:5, Insightful)
This brought back memories of a paragraph from the Feynman report after the challenger disaster which warns precisely about this:
We have also found that certification criteria used in Flight Readiness Reviews often develop a gradually decreasing strictness. The argument that the same risk was flown before without failure is often accepted as an argument for the safety of accepting it again. Because of this, obvious weaknesses are accepted again and again, sometimes without a sufficiently serious attempt to remedy them, or to delay a flight because of their continued presence.
Re:Very sad... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Very sad... (Score:5, Informative)
The emergency exit business is the hatch on the side, astronauts hook to a pole and slide out. Only if they have time. Parachute down.
They made no indication that they knew anything was wrong before contact was lost.
There was a report on FOX that a tile or some piece had come off on launch and hit a wing, was not supposed to be a problem. Not sure if that was this missions launch or not.
Re:Very sad... (Score:5, Informative)
It is, however it won't help them. Even if the front compartment survived the explosion, it will still drop all the way down.
That's what happened to Challenger btw. At least some were alive for the 20 or minutes or so it took to hit the water. While there were no recordings, evidence was found, such as the emergency air supply being turned on for the pilot -- that can only be done behind the seat by another person, so it was obvious people were moving around.
Let's all hope that is NOT the case this time. That would be a simply horrible prolonged way to die
Re:Very sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
sorrow. remorse. anger at the u.s. for not building more modern designs and retiring that overdesigned piece of aerospace contractage.
NASA will get all the blame, but those astronauts today died of terminal cheapness on the U.S.'s part. The Shuttle is a late-60's design, bastardized by Air Force demands into a flying boxcar. the tiles were a good idea 32 years ago, but we should have built a new shuttle from newer alloys, based on what we learned from what is essentially a prototype space vehicle.
but all this for later. i fear the euopean and U.S. manned space program will be killed from this.
rest in peace, people.
Re:Very sad... (Score:5, Interesting)
You are correct, it wasn't 20. It was a bit over 3 minutes. My memory seems to have exaggerated after almost 20 years.
"Analysis of crew cabin wreckage indicates the shuttle's windows may have survived the explosion. It is thus possible the crew did not experience high-altitude cabin decompression. If so, some or all of the astronauts may have been alive and conscious all the way to impact in the Atlantic some 18 miles northeast of the launch pad. The cabin hit the water at better than 200 mph on Scobee's side. The metal posts of the two forward flight deck seats, for example, were bent sharply to the right by force of impact when the cabin disintegrated.
"The internal crew module components recovered were crushed and distorted, but showed no evidence of heat or fire," the commission report said. "A general consistency among the components was a shear deformation from the top of the components toward the +Y (to the right) direction from a force acting from the left. Components crushed or sheared in the above manner included avionics boxes from all three avionics bays, crew lockers, instrument panels and the seat frames from the commander and the pilot. The more extensive and heavier crush damage appeared on components nearer the upper left side of the crew module. The magnitude and direction of the crush damage indicates that the module was in a nose down and steep left bank attitude when it hit the water.
"The fact that pieces of forward fuselage upper shell were recovered with the crew module indicates that the upper shell remained attached to the crew module until water impact. Pieces of upper forward fuselage shell recovered or found with the crew module included cockpit window frames, the ingress/egress hatch, structure around the hatch frame and pieces of the left and right sides. The window glass from all of the windows, including the hatch window, was fractured with only fragments of glass remaining in the frames."
Several large objects were tracked by radar after the shuttle disintegrated. One such object, classified as "Object D," hit the water 207 seconds after launch about 18 nautical miles east of launch pad 39B. This apparently was the crew cabin."
Re:Very sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
This is terrible news; it feels like the Challenger all over. Just as senseless, just as disturbing. These people risked their lives to better mankind, and it's terrible that this could happen to such noble people.
I keep switching stations, and I'm tired of hearing about "6 Americans and 1 Israeli". 7 people were in that shuttle. It's frustrating that the media can't let go of war sensationalism even now, at a time like this.
Re:Very sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
Just think of the amount of fuel you'd have to use to propel something from the Earth to the Space Shuttle at a velocity high enough to actually hit it-- probably the only thing fast enough on this planet that could carry that much fuel would be another Space Shuttle.
Look, even if you remove every terrorist from the planet, bad things are still going to happen-- even to Americans.
Your assuming it was a missle.... (Score:4, Insightful)
One again, as I said highly unlikely to impossible. I believe it was a mechanical failure of some sort.
But flying 2 jumbo jets into the Twin Towers, destroying the towers and killing 1000s of people was unlikely too. So I retain some skeptism of "accidents" especially on such a large target.
Brian Ellenberger
Re:Very sad... (Score:4, Informative)
At 200,000 feet, there'd be no way to survive.
Re:Please (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Please (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is it always a small prayer? What is the proper ratio of prayer time to disaster magnitude?
If prayer works, and only a small prayer is required, then why didn't you pray before this happened, you insensitive clod?
What exactly will you pray for? Is the ship supposed to reintegrate now?
Do me a favor and say a long prayer. Quietly. That should keep you busy for a while. The rest of us have work to do.
Disaster magnitude? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Disaster magnitude? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think we can understand how profound that step was. This dream is older than us, older than our civilization, and older than any history or record that survives the ravages of time. And now we've made it real. We've seen birds fly, but nothing living on this earth above the level of virus has ever ventured beyond it. That is a unique human achievement, perhaps in a sense our greatest.
That is why this is a greater disaster. Because it hinders our pursuit of the dream. People do not stop flying because a twin-engine plane goes down. But there is a real chance our resolve will weaken, and we will let this dream slip back to the shadows. Mankind needs a dream, to reach for the unimaginable. Space is our dream. We cannot afford to lose it, or we lose much more than lives.
We all have to die. The tragic part of this is that these people will not get to see their children grow up, and their families suffer one of the greatest losses they can suffer. But if I were to pick the way I would die, daring the exploration of the stars is a great way to go. Better to die daring greatly, then remain always what might have been. That is our risk, and that is humanity's risk - that we become what might have been. We make mistakes, we suffer loss, but we dare greatness. That is what makes humanity worthwhile.
Re:Please (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope,
That five years from now, the wife of one of the astornauts will one day look up and see the bright stars, and smile.
That ten years from now, one of the children of the astronauts will pick up one of the dusty flight-manuals out of a dusty box, and read one.
That fifteen years from now, one of the husbands will look across the breakfast table at his daughter be proud, knowing that his daughter is entering flight school - just like her mom.
That 20 years from now, there will be a small memoral, to the fallen. Placed on the soil of Mars.
Irresponsible Fear Mongering! (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait. Watch. Pay attention. We don't need more noise in the signal.
Re:Irresponsible Fear Mongering! (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact that there was an Israeli onboard does mean that terrorism is a significantly more likely cause than it would be if there wasn't. The news people would be incompetent if they didn't acknowledge this fact.
Re:Holy fuck (Score:4, Insightful)
Space exploration is hard and it is dangerous, and there's always the chance of an accident. All the people on board new this, all their families and colleagues on the ground knew this, but *they did it anyway*.
I just hope the powers that be don't use their deaths as an excuse to write off what's left of the space programme.
Before everyone gets hung up on terrorism... (Score:4, Informative)
Source: cnn.com [cnn.com]
Re:I heard it (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, now I get it! We're supposed to be discriminating against Muslims, not just middle-eastern people! Do you even stop to consider the fact that not every Muslim is a terrorist? It's like saying that every Catholic has 47 kids and will kill a Protestant on sight (a few of them do it in Northern Ireland, that must make it true). Same for Protestants, right? Or what about the undeniable fact that every Hindu either works in a convenience store or lives on the top of a mountain? Les't not even mention the Jews. We all know what THEY're like.
Sir, you are a moron. The odds that terrorism is a factor in this tragedy are sitting at about 0.00000001% right now. They claim that some insulation fell from the shuttle when they launched. Well if my brief experience with thermodynamics is any lesson, it's that things (like space shuttles) get really hot when they have a lot of friction trying to stop their rapid movement (like when they're landing). If something did fall, then I'd be highly suspect that there was some sort of external problem with the shuttle which overheated and caused an explosion. Or maybe not. It's still a lot more likely than your "terrorism".
Re:I heard it (Score:4, Funny)
Probably Iraq!
* I'm being sarcastic. Most likely this was some kind of mechanical failure and I'm sure I'll feel really bad for the families as soon as this sinks in a little. I'm still in shock.
Re:Plutonium on board? (Score:5, Insightful)
Would you want to put something very radioactive in a very confined space with 7 people?
Would you want to launch a strong radioactive source on top of a chemical rocket which always has a (slight) possiblitly of crashing?
Somehow I doubt it. People need to calm down. What happened is bad enough without trying to frighten yourself, and others, with wild speculation.
Re:figures (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The shuttle was the oldest (Score:5, Insightful)
Columbia was built in 1978, first flown in 1981. thats 3 years. Now, scroll the time back to the beginning of the design process. Even if Bush handed NASA an unlimited budget the day he made it into office, we wouldn't have a new shuttle to use today.
Now, terrorism? Yeah, the terrorists have a missle that can hit a Mach20+ target. *sarcasm*
Seven explorers died today. Get off your political high horses, and think about that. Accidents do happen.
My thoughts are with the families of the crews.
Re:Best wishes and a cheap shot. (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, contrary to the perception I have put across, I like Bush, and in particular, I have great intrinsic respect for Powell and Bush's other aids. But the greatest crimes that could come of this are demeriting the space program, or using this as a jaunt for warmongering.
To the media, terrorism sells, but it taints the memory of what these people died doing. I fear there is great opportunity to spoil the spirit of their purpose in life by using their death as ammunition for unrelated, even ruefully contradictory, causes.
Not to assume their death; miracles happen. But hopefully their lives will be worth celebrating in what they have brought to humanity, and not what use they have as a political tool in death. But that is a terribly obnoxious thing to think and say; I am sure that Bush will honour their memory with reinvigorated interest in the exploration these people dedicated their lives to.
Re:How soon the next shuttle flight? (Space statio (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Don't forget about the crew on the Space Statio (Score:5, Informative)
Do you know anything about the ISS? The reason there's only three crew members? Because the Soyuz "lifeboat" attached to the ISS to be used in case of an emergency can only hold three people.
So no, there is no rush to get the shuttle back in service to retrieve the ISS crew, the crew can easily return on the Soyuz capsule. However, once the lifeboat is used, they won't leave the station manned without a replacement.
Considering the financial woes of the Russians, it's likely NASA will shut down the ISS until the shuttle program is back up and running.
Re:Our prayers are with (Score:5, Insightful)
Keep everyone at NASA in your thoughts/prayers.. every person feels a sense of pride when a mission is successful, and likewise a sense of guilt when something tragic happens. I've read numerous books/articles/whatnot about the previous NASA tragedies and they not only affect the crews and families but the engineers and maintenance people who work with these vehicles and systems. The level of guilt (up to the point of some taking their own lives) is extremely difficult to handle.
Think not only of the crew and families; think of the entire NASA family.
-r
Re:All I can say is . . . (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Hrmmm... mars? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Never mind Mars, what about the ISS? (Score:5, Insightful)
Three now. Four including the original Enterprise. I wonder if they'll retrofit her now, to replace Columbia?
Unlikely. The Enterprise was never meant to go into space and is only for training inside the atmosphere. Retrofitting it would probably be more work and money than building a whole new shuttle. Enterprise is also very old, and it is likely that Columbia's age played an indirect part in this accident. If I were an astronaut, I would not want to fly on a retrofitted Enterprise.
How about the whole ISS project anyway? Is this going to toast that for good, too?
I expect rocky times ahead for the ISS. The United States is the primary financial backer and provides basically all of the manned missions. Without our support, the ISS is toast. I expect not only NASA to investigate and put things on hold, but also Congress. They are the ones that apropriate funding to NASA. Expect a lot of Congressional debate about our space program in the near future. I would not be surprised if this accelerates plans to privative NASA, an idea that our government has been kicking around for a while. We already contract out a lot of work at NASA.
Re:Now for the real jokes.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)
Reality check (Score:4, Informative)
I don't mean to offend, but you obviously don't know what you are talking about.
The space shuttle is an amazing technology, but all the shuttles are going to fly until they can't.
Of course. Why would they stop using them if they were still good? The orbiters were designed to be able to launched at least 100 times. The Columbia, while over twenty years old, was still well within its operational lifetime. There are commercial jetliners twice as old as Columbia still in active service today.
Furthermore, it isn't like this was some beat-up automobile that someone was still trying to coax a few more miles out of. Each orbiter is subject to a complete inspection after every launch. Systems which can no longer do their job are upgraded or replaced. NASA's shuttle fleet is probably the best maintained equipment in human history.
"...why does it have to re-enter so fast..."
Because it is in orbit. An orbit is achieved by traveling fast enough that your rate of fall toward the center of gravity (Earth, in this case) is canceled out. I believe the orbiter travels at a relative ground speed of something like 17,000 miles per hour.
In order to decelerate from that great velocity, they use the atmospheric breaking. Just as the breaks in your car use friction to slow the car, the orbiter uses atmospheric friction to slow the orbiter.
It is an inherently dangerous situation (second only to launch in risk), but an unavoidable one.
How?
It's a reasonable question. There is a good reason every spacecraft ever flown by man has used an unpowered re-entry: Fuel. You would need a lot of fuel to control that kind of velocity. That means added weight, and weight is everything when it comes to launching a vehicle from a gravity well. Every pound of weight on the space shuttle costs approximately five thousand dollars to launch.
A powered landing would not only be impractically expensive, it would likely be technologically impossible. It makes no sense.
Again: How? Velocities of thousands of miles per hour. Altitudes of hundreds of thousands of miles. Temperatures of hundreds of degrees Fahrenheit. It isn't like they can just jump out. To survive, you would basically need to build another spacecraft. See above about weight.
The heat shield is one of the weaker points in the design of most spacecraft. Keep in mind that building a realistic heat shield pushes our materials technology to the edge. While you might think that building a single surface with no seams would be better, but that is not so. It would in fact be considerably harder and more expensive to build. It would also be much harder to maintain. The shuttle's tiles can be easily replaced when they inevitably degrade. Not so with a single surface.
On one hand, you're suggesting infeasible or impossible improvements. Now you suggest they subject it to unnecessary risk? Why?
The space shuttle is already one of the most heavily monitored devices ever built by man. Huge amounts of data are constantly transmitted, recorded, and analyized by computers and people, both onboard the spacecraft and on the ground. What do you suggest they do differently?