Images of Endeavour's Damaged Tiles 331
Roland Piquepaille writes "Neptec Design Group, a Canadian company and a NASA prime contractor for 25 space missions, was kind enough to send me exclusive images of Endeavour's damaged tiles during its last take-off. So here are some of these pictures" The pictures are pretty amazing and make the urgency of this whole thing much more amazing.
Exclusive images? (Score:5, Informative)
Direct link to the images. (Score:5, Informative)
Image 1 [blogsforcompanies.com]
Thermal Image [blogsforcompanies.com]
Image 2 [blogsforcompanies.com]
Image 3 [blogsforcompanies.com]
Image extracted from a video made by Neptec LCS [blogsforcompanies.com]
Re:Err on the side of caution...don't you think? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think you realize the inherent danger in attempting to fix these either.
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:5, Informative)
Development of the ETs thermal protection system has been problematic, and has proven a fatal weakness to shuttle mission safety. NASA has had difficulty preventing fragments of foam from detaching during flight, ever since a 1995 decision to remove chlorofluorocarbon-11 (CFC-14) from the composition of the foam in compliance with an Environmental Protection Agency ban on CFCs under section 610 of the Clean Air Act. In its place, a hydrochlorofluorocarbon known as HCFC 141b was certified for use and phased into the shuttle program. The "new" foam containing HCFC 141b was first used on the aft dome portion of ET-82 during the flight of STS-79 in 1996. Use of HCFC 141b was expanded to the ETs acreage, or larger portions of the tank, starting with ET-88, which flew on STS-86 in 1997.
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Is it so urgent? (Score:2, Informative)
The vehicle could stay up longer in an unmanned configuration, but still has limited fuel resources to run the OMS. The shuttle just isn't designed to go anywhere but orbit and back.
wrong (Score:5, Informative)
Foam does more damage than ice. Ice is dense and keeps its velocity high, which translates to a low velocity relative to the shuttle. Foam on the other hand is much less dense and slows down very quickly, translating to high velocities relative to the shuttle.
Remember, kinetic energy = 0.5 * mass * V^2. Velocity is what kills, not mass.
More information (Score:2, Informative)
It seems they are not that big, and I do not think one or 2 damaged tiles whould have a massive effect on the safety of the shuttle. However if someone leaked that tiles were damaged (no matter how few tiles) and NASA did not act on it, the public would be outraged. So perhaps NASA thinks its best to mention this in public and fix it, even if it doesnt have to be fixed at all. Or what if the chance is 1 in a million that it has any effect, NASA doesnt act and the thing crashed, people would be outraged as well. Better safe than sorry.
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:3, Informative)
Sure, if you redesign the entire thing. That tail sticking up kinda screws that idea.
That way any impacts from ice or foam would strike surfaces not critical for reentry.
'Non critical'. Like the windshields, flight controls, thinner skin of the body. Non critical stuff like that.
*Yawn* (Score:3, Informative)
-mcgrew
Re:[AC]THIS IS INSANITY! (Score:3, Informative)
Whens the last time the Europeans have launched humans into space? *crickets*
Delicate tiles (Score:5, Informative)
I asked the presenter specifically about how delicate they felt. He then "flicked"/snapped the tile with his finger/fingernail, which put a sizeable dent into the tile, easily cracking the brittle black layer, and you could see the white foam underneath.
Therefore, it's no surprise to me to see this kind of damage. It probably wasn't even impacted with what could be considered excessive force.
Makes you wonder what kind of tile damage shuttles had -- all those successfully landed shuttle missions -- before such close scrutiny.
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:5, Informative)
This point about how the foam insulation process was changed has come up many times in discussions about the damage to Endeavor. And it's wrong.
It has its origin in one of Rush Limbaugh's lies [mediamatters.org]. As it turns out, the foam that dealt Columbia the death blow was the old-style CFC foam. The problem was in the hand-spraying application method used on that area, which left gaps and voids in the foam.
Yes, when they first started using the CFC-free foam in 1997 there were some problems seen. Changes were quickly made to improve the adhesion.
There were also plenty of problems with the CFC foam - "popcorning" from trapped air bubbled was noted in 1995 [newscientist.com], while in 1992 Columbia was struck by a large piece of foam, ripping a 12cm gouge in the tiles. Both of these were before the switch to CFC-free foam.
Re:Is it so urgent? (Score:3, Informative)
For just about every other problem, there is a workaround. Fire the reentry rockets at the wrong time? Not great, but you can land at a different runway.
Other than that, it could be completely guided from the ground.
The Russians flew theirs unmanned, and it only flew the once, because the crew module and software wasn't finished.
Re:[AC]wrong (Score:5, Informative)
April 10, 2007 (Score:4, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_TMA-10 [wikipedia.org]
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:2, Informative)
Russia is a European country. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Ol' Bricks and Wings (Score:3, Informative)
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Err on the side of caution...don't you think? (Score:4, Informative)
The tile was then passed from student to student. As I said above, it was as hard as ceramic and as light as styrofoam. Even if an astronaut hit a tile deliberately with a sharp instrument, it is unlikely they could damage it.
I'm not sure what your teacher was showing you, but the Shuttle tiles are quite definitely fragile. See these articles:
Rich.
Re:How long has this been happening? (Score:3, Informative)
The Air Force bears much of the blame.
They wanted to be able to launch NRO payloads, and with the Keyhole platform, that meant the larger cargo bay, and "high-inclination" orbits, (ie. Vandenberg. . . ie "cross-range capability"). Well, Thiokol never delivered on the SRB's that would have given the cross-range capability, so that was the first thing to get shitcanned. So the Air Force was already screwed there, and for much of the 1980's could not launch NRO payloads into high-inclination orbits.
Then Challenger happened, and the Air Force whined to congress - because now they couldn't launch NRO payloads AT ALL. So they got the EELV program (Atlas/Titan/Delta - where Atlas and Titan were mainly recycled ICBM's - and now, Atlas is a totally new platform based on the old design.) - after that, the Shuttle really needed a new purpose in life, and got one, in the way of the ISS. Say what you will about it - I'm not a big fan of it myself - I think it shows a lack of vision, and was really driven as a means of pork-continuation. Though, we did learn a lot about international collaboration on a really huge, really complex project. That has to be worth something.
In the aftermath of Columbia - I'm not sure that recycling Shuttle technology and hardware is the best approach to getting a new generation of launch vehicles. But given the likely funding profiles, who knows if even THAT will succeed?