NASA Decides No Fix Needed for Endeavor's Tiles 209
bhmit1 writes "It looks like NASA is reporting that no repairs are needed for Endeavor. 'After meeting for five hours, mission managers opted Thursday night against any risky spacewalk repairs, after receiving the results of one final thermal test. The massive amount of data indicated Endeavor would suffer no serious structural damage during next week's re-entry. Their worry was not that Endeavor might be destroyed and its seven astronauts killed in a replay of the Columbia disaster — the gouge is too small to be catastrophic. They were concerned that the heat of re-entry could weaken the shuttle's aluminum frame at the damaged spot and result in lengthy post-flight repairs.'"
I'm glad I don't have to make these calls (Score:5, Insightful)
It reminds me of a while back when a friend of mine called his mother to tell her he had a few drinks and was gonna stay the night at a friend's house. Her response was, "Yeah, I wouldn't want anything to happen to the car."
Regardless, I admire their fortitude given the history of the Columbia and all that has happened. I hope everything goes well and they get home safely.
--
Captialism: When it uses the carrot, it's called democracy. When it uses the stick, it's called facism.
IANAAE (Score:4, Insightful)
I've seen photos and 3D imaging of the bashed tiles. I know very little of the forces involved. I have seen no structural analysis of the materials that are beneath the deepest part of the gouge.
To a limited extent, I can compare this damage to the past damaged tiles. There seem to have been a number of similar damaged tiles in the past, and those flights landed safely.
The astronauts could slap some of that goop on the gouge, but risk damaging the tiles by accident, or changing the aerodynamics of the craft.
There are many unknowns. I really don't know what will happen when Endeavour reenters.
I wish them well, and hope that NASA can complete the remaining shuttle flights without mishap.
Hey, NASA, here's an idea... (Score:5, Interesting)
As a former USAF avionics specialist and later crew chief, one thing was always true:
The decision about air-worthiness, mission-worthiness was the pilot's, the aircraft commander.
It didn't matter if I told him that sure, the plane will fly, if he didn't like it, the plane didn't fly.
So, NASA, provide all the information to the commander, pilot, and crew, and let THEM make the call. If you don't like what they decide, it can be taken up AFTER the mission.
Re:Hey, NASA, here's an idea... (Score:5, Informative)
But that's the difference between an aircraft and a spacecraft -- an aircraft pilot can look his plane over, read up on the maintenance, talk to his ground crew and then decide to fly or not. In NASA, it works differently. A Space Shuttle commander has command of the spacecraft, but Mission Control in Houston has command of the mission. You have to remember: the crew of the Shuttle can't just go bombing around in Earth orbit like they are flying the Millennium Falcon. Every move has to be choreographed and planned out months and even years in advance. When unexpected problems crop up, the technicians on the ground certainly know more about the workings of the machine than the crew, as they have all the data at the fingertips, they are experts in their systems, and they can draw on contractor resources to get more information. Decisions like this cannot be left to the spacecraft commander; his/her job is hard enough without having to keep in their head the compendious amount of information regarding their spacecraft.
It has been this way since Mercury; it was Chris Kraft who outlined the need for the ground to have the skills required to manage the mission and deal with problems in real time, so that the crew could concentrate on their activities in space. The system has worked extremely well over all these years, with the exception of the Columbia accident. I for one am confident that NASA knows what it is doing and will take all the precautions it can before Endeavour is allowed to land.
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Egads, there's another one???
"328Xwhatevers x-trained to Nosepickers" represent!
I did it to escape Moody in the F-4 days, but it sure made promotion testing easier.
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Wow, I ended up cross training several times.
Started out as a cop at RAF Upper Heyford, went back to Lackland as an MTI, then A-10 gun, then Avionics and finally chief on the C-5's out at Travis.
There were bonuses or really good training locations each time I did that. If you count Biloxi as a really good training location.
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Not the only choice, Sparky.
Does anyone see a need for a better lifeboat than Soyuz?
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And follow orders from Houston. So much for sticking it to the man.
* Return it home, unmanned. If it burns up, relief. Go home in Soyuz.
Believe it or not you actually need a pilot for the first few and last few moments of reentry. See below for my Soyuz comments.
* Fix it, fly it home.
Not sure how feasible this is without ground support. They may or may not have written procedures onboard.
* Park it, fly home in Soyuz (in shifts because of n
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Fly it home, unfixed is what Houston has ordered. Hopefully the man who made decision has signed his name to it.
Soyuz - There are 2 available, the stationed there is set up for remote all the way. They have the supply craft available, for remote all the way. All the parts are available, the Russians actually have several near completion at all times, they could have a new supply craft ready to go before food and air stores get too critical. Remember, the shuttle has some as well. The Russians have an incre
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The decision is by committee. The consensus to fly home was made last night and was unanimous among the committee. They did extensive analysis both with CFD, analytical models and arc jet testing.
They do have procedures, and materials. Since the last disaster, they have sent up patch kits. If its not adequate, they can send up one that is on the next go round. They chose not to patch because
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There are several places, but the best source is the current schedule.
Space Flight Now is an excellent resource. You may not know this, but, the 40 year average for Soyuz launches is 5.3 per year, with a much faster pace now.
Launch Dates
Currently ready for flight, waiting for payload or just its time:
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And remember, looking at Soyuz entries on SFN, Soyuz is a vehicle, not a capsule. For example, the September 14 mission will NOT have a man-rated capsule aboard. It will have the Foton M3 microgravity research capsul
Memo to all NASA employees: (Score:4, Funny)
However tempting it may be, given the considerable savings, please don't source any more tiles from "Home Depot".
NASA Mgmt.
Re:I'm glad I don't have to make these calls (Score:5, Insightful)
If the only thing mission control was worried about was "the precious shuttle", then they would have just sent them out right away to fix the gouge.
Spacewalks are potentially dangerous. Micro-meteorites could tear right through a spacesuit and instantly kill an astronaut. They aren't taken lightly and are always judged whether the benefits justify the risks. In this case, they didn't.
Meteroid speed (Score:3, Interesting)
Couldn't they just create some type of shield such as teflon or some other strong material to be placed a short distance from them covering their backs? I would assume that the spacecraft covers their front.
The faster meteoroids might be travelling at roughly 30-40 km/sec. (*) [anl.gov] In comparison, here on Earth the fastest bullets cruise at around 1.2 km/sec, with slower bullets loping about in the neighborhood of 0.3 to 0.6 km/sec. (*) [hypertextbook.com]
All the strong layers of whatever you want to strap onto an astronaut in addition to all the crap s/he's already got to wear and maneuver through won't help all that much against a small particle moving at that speed.
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From a certain point of view - that's all that really does matter.
Astronauts are a dime-a-dozen. NASA currently has nearly 150 on the payroll - even if we fired the crew after each flight, we could fly 20 missions before we needed more. For every astronaut NASA currently has, there are 10 or more equally well qualified candidates available to be hired and trained.
But the Shuttle itself is a
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Re:I'm glad I don't have to make these calls (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, I see what you're saying. The damage may indeed be comparable to previous missions that went off without a hitch. And it is true, all of the lab tests show no cause for concern. But as another poster mentioned below, all the lab tests in the world can't make up for a real world scenario. The real world always has another trick up it's sleeve.
And you also need to realize that NASA needs to be extra cautious. A repeat of the Columbia disaster would raise some serious concerns about their credibility and may be detrimental to the future of space exploration in general.
--
Capitalism: When it uses the carrot, it's called democracy. When it uses the stick, it's called facism.
Re:I'm glad I don't have to make these calls (Score:5, Insightful)
In all fairness, nobody at NASA knew the extent of the damage to Columbia prior to reentry. There were engineers who suspected that there might be some, and wanted photography to be sure, which NASA disallowed. If the existence of a large hole in the leading edge of the wing was known, some type of rescue operation could possibly have been put into place, as there was no repair possibility at that time.
In this case, NASA had detailed imagery of the damaged area several days before the return. That allowed for detailed analysis and laboratory testing, which have apparently convinced NASA that the extent of damage is limited enough that no repairs are required prior to reentry.
I would like to know what assumptions were used in making the "no repair" decision, nonetheless. It would seem to me that even if the damage was not severe enough to REQUIRE the repair, this situation provided a chance to test out the newly developed repair techniques and materials in a "real world" setting, allowing engineers and future crews to gain more confidence in the repairs if and when they are required on a future mission. Is the risk of an EVA/repair causing further damage really high enough to justify throwing away what could be a very valuable "learning experience"?
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-nB
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The disappointing thing about Columbia however, is that knowing no rescue or repair would be possible they decided additional imaging was unnecessary:
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In all fairness, nobody at NASA knew the extent of the damage to Columbia prior to reentry. There were engineers who suspected that there might be some, and wanted photography to be sure, which NASA disallowed. If the existence of a large hole in the leading edge of the wing was known, some type of rescue operation could possibly have been put into place, as there was no repair possibility at that time.
Engineers at NASA requested that the management contact the DoD to have spy satellites examine the Shuttle
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If you mean "derail manned spaceflight at NASA," you have to admit that it would be for good reason. If NASA proved themselves to be that incompetent then they really shouldn't be doing manned spaceflight! (And I say that as an ardent supporter of the space program.)
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They don't care enough about space exploration to halt the use of old systems like the Shuttle, continue exploration with unmanned systems, then send meat into space with more mature technology.
This isn't 1492, and we are under no pressure to send crews off in the modern equivalent
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What bothers me isn't that there are people taking risks to advance our knowledge. What bothers me is that they are taking risks to prevent advancing our knowledge.
It took more than 100 flights and the loss of a ship with its crew to make NASA start looking at what happens to a shuttle during launch.
It's one thing when people die because you couldn't foresee a problem in a new wing design or
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Which is why, even after having collected and analyzed all the data that they do now in response to the Columbia disaster which even from the beginning seemed to show that this was a fairly minor issue, they still spent five hours discussing it before finally deciding that they sho
Re:I'm glad I don't have to make these calls (Score:5, Informative)
Or what if the 'goop', applied unevenly, causes a hot spot on another tile? Right now, the damaged tiles are located over a wing spar - the thickest structural part of the wing, and a section that can take more heating. Since the depth of the gouge indicates that the plasma flow over it will 'eddy' over the deepest area, keeping it from the greatest heat of reentry, models indicate that the aluminum structure of the shuttle won't fail, and that temperatures won't exceed 350f.
The problem with speculating on NASA decisions, as so many coffee urn quarterbacks are doing this morning, is that they really have no idea how complex the shuttle and its mission really are. The items I've outlined here, available in almost no major news stories about the decision, were easily obtained at NASA Tv and Aviation week - and they're a small sample of the factors in this decision.
somewhat agree but... (Score:2)
I am prepared to go along with the experts, but it still seems to me that the "downside" of repairing the hole has been wildly exaggerated. IMO it seems unlikely in the extreme, (based on previous mission reported experiences), that an astronaut would damage the underbelly of the shuttle by fixing it. It's
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Underbelly operations are not par for the course. In fact they were impossible before Columbia. The Canadarm could not reach the belly of the Shuttle prior. The top of the Shuttle is mostly not composed of fragile tiles. After Col
A chance for testing lost (Score:4, Interesting)
Having firm, experimental data about:
* The process of applying the patch
* How well the patch stands up to re-entry
* How well the patch protects underlying systems
and more. Better to get this data on a 'non-critical' bit of damage than waiting until something is REALLY busted before finding the inadequecy.
They've done extensive testing on the ground, I'm sure, but a real-world test scenario can trump ten lab extrapolations. That's why we do external betas of software, the real world always has something up it's sleeve.
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While I was writing my previous response I thought about the idea of 'pre-patching' some tiles near the rear of the shuttle before launch, in order to see how well those tiles did on reentry. Can you imagine the outcry if NASA suggested purposely -damaging- a few 'unimportant tiles' before the mission even begins? And I doubt you can easily add a few spare tiles to the a
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Yet another reason manned exploration using primitive technology is so limiting. We should park the shuttle and develop unmanned systems with self-repair capabilities.
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They did. They are able to inspect the tiles, that's how we have all those photographs and other data about it that allowed them to decide that the danger was minimal. They did come up with a repair method, but they haven't been able to actually try it, and it's very dangerous. You don't just hop out into the vacuum and go scurrying around the belly of the shuttle near all those delicate tiles just for pr
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I'd argue it's better to wait until the shuttle's really busted before trying out complex repair maneuvers. In that case, the shuttle's already a writeoff; if the astronaut crashes into the tiles or they're otherwise damaged, it won't matter.
infamous powerpoint presentation (Score:3, Interesting)
Now that link is a bit of a read, but a very striking introduction on influencing decision-making with presentation techniques, even if this costs other people's lives.
NASA needs to get out of the media black hole (Score:2, Interesting)
Endeavour is currently on the sixth shuttle mission since Columbia was lost. On Slashdot there's a chance that somebody could tell you what was achieved on any of those six missions. Ask an average member of the public though, and I guarantee you that less than 1% have any idea of a single piece of scientific research achieved on any of those six flights.
A large number of those members of the public will be able to tell you
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Spirit and Opportunity have entered year three, well past their 90 day expected life span, yet I'd wager the lost Polar Lander and crashed Climate Orbiter got more press than the little rovers that could ever will.
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I wouldn't take NASA to task for not keeping the media up-to-date when you don't do so for yourself.
NASA does give copious quantities of information to the media. (Video, still, and tex
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I was completely in agreement with you up until you dropped this one.
The last thing we need is further adoption of the "Bush Doctrine" of suppressing any information that a government agency decides that the public doesn't need to know. I actually think it admirable that NASA is now so open concerning potential problems with shuttle flights, and would like to see it continue.
Besides, if they were to hide such information, and an ac
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I mean, we're keeping the shuttle around to finish the ISS, which we're building to give the shuttle some place to go...
Takes more than a former teacher on board... (Score:2)
Didn't even START until T-30 seconds.
The commentator kept talking OVER the astronauts and CAPCOM voice feed. Heaven forbid the blow-dried talking head SHUT UP for a few minutes!
Ended even before SRB separation.
If I were one of the shuttle astronauts (Score:2)
One final test (Score:5, Funny)
While playing Stairway to Heaven, bic lighters were waved back and forth over the affected area.
To err on the side of caution... (Score:2, Insightful)
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They have a patch kit, but in applying the patch they could weaken the tiles that they're patching. So it's a tradeoff. If they perform the repair and all goes well, then they're probably better off than before. But if something goes wrong during the repair, things could get a lot worse.
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If they used the caulk, I would worry about the goop bubbling out or not being flush with the surrounding surface, thereby creating drag which may pull the whole tile out, which would leave a
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If it aint [all that] broke, don't fix it. (Score:4, Informative)
Now, the compound has to be applied by an astronaut attached to a long extension arm attached to the Shuttle's robotic arm. When they tested this a few flights ago, it became readily apparent that it was at best difficult to work this way. The length of the arm caused significant 'bouncing' with every motion. At the time they only pulled a gap filler and simulated the motion of filling a tile and it wasn't easy.
The real danger is that the control issues of having a 'massive' astronaut + EVA gear swinging around on the end of that very long arm so close to the TPS could actually cause more damage to the tiles than it fixed.
Furthermore, the compound could actually cause even worse localised heating issues on re-entry depending on how well it fills the tile ie: It could cause ducting etc.
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What's risky about this isn't the space walk itself but the concept of damaging more tiles. It's a delicate operation and one slip can make things go from bad to worse easily.
Perhaps there is a financial motivation for not carrying out the repair?
What financial motivation? The material already exist onboard. There is no investment and the amounts by which NASA would be set back in the case of a mid-air breakup or even a safe landing with an unus
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Delicate tiles? What? Are they made out of...sugar? Snapping them with a touch of the finger? WTF? Are you HIGH?
What I want to know is.... who the hell designed this tile shield? A pack of retarded monkeys? Why in hell would you spec a tile that when patched, becomes more likely to fail?
I'm old enough to remember the first shuttle landing when a half dozen of the little bastards fell off. I remember thinking it was a fluke, since it was the first flig
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http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/technology/sts -newsref/sts_sys.html [nasa.gov]
My structural physics knowledge is a bit lacking, but something made of 10% rigid fibre 1-2mm thick and 90% void
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I managed to easily put some marks into my sample before I smartened up and kept it in its case.
Not even Duct tape?! (Score:4, Funny)
Angry General (Score:2)
Son, what do you mean you've blown my multi-billion dollar shuttle ?
Pissing-in-his-pants Soldier:
Well, there was this small gouge you see, we had experts analyze it and they said it was not urgent.
Angry General:
you mean you wouldn't spend a few tens of thousand bucks to keep a multi-billion shuttle in good health ? I'll tell you what, why don't you and your experts go clean the toilets with your tongue while you think things through...
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A bit of Tile prediction History: all bad (Score:2, Informative)
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see here [nasaspaceflight.com]
And:
here (with pictures). [nasaspaceflight.com]
The tests at Arc Jet used a set of tiles, with identical damage drilled on to a test article. This was then put through the heat of a simulated re-entry, to test how the damaged area performed, along with the gathering of ther
how many tile defects in past? (Score:2)
Nasa Repair Plan reminds me of.... (Score:2)
I hope they didn't just spend all that money so that could check the "Disaster Recovery" check box on some form and quiet the complaints.
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NASA's tested applying the goop on practice tiles on the end of the arm. Here's the thing: the arm wobbles. the underbelly of the shuttle is fragile. Astronauts on an EVA don't exactly have the same forces availabl
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NASA's tested applying the goop on practice tiles on the end of the arm. Here's the thing: the arm wobbles. the underbelly of the shuttle is fragile. Astronauts on an EVA don't exactly have the same forces available that we do to react instantly. Stuff floats out there, inertia, all that stuff. One wrong hiccup and that 400-500 pound weight is crashing into the shuttle and there's no way to stop it.
Aren't these this kind of things that all that money and testing were supposed to account for?
That's why the d
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That pretty much sums up how I feel about any disaster recovery plan. It sorta hits close to home in a way for me, too, actually. We (well, I...) had to do that over the past weekend: we had a production server for a small business (read: too
An odd decision (Score:2)
Also, this would a chance to test the repair kits in a real world scenario. It's a simple 2x2 matrix of whether is works or not and whether it was needed or not. The only problem is if the repair d
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Imagine doing something that requires fine motor control (like, smoothly filling a space with fairly sticky stuff) under the following conditions:
NASA PR vs. Nature (Score:2)
I would recommend they go ahead and test the goop in the shuttle bay and even paint it and see how it does in the vacuumn and exposed to sunlight for a day. Then th
aluminum frame (Score:2)
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What if the astronaut crashes into the tiles? What if the arm locks up? What if the repairs cause more damage to the tiles? NASA's a very conservative organization. They already take risks that'd make most people white, they're not keen to take on more than they have to.
If a shuttle gets damaged to the point where repairs are required, it won't matter if the situation is made worse because it's already des
Why do we send people into space? (Score:2, Interesting)
Isn't the whole justification for manned missions that people can react and do a lot more than robots, at least at this point in time? And yet we're afraid to let them out the door to actually do anything. Time and again when people are given the chance to perform they rise to the occasion and exceed expectations.
Remind me, how many astronauts have we lost on spacewalks?
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The problem with that is that the lives of the crew are riding on the potential repair. Without knowing the effect in advance, the risk in making the repair is increased, beyond the risk the crew undergoes in suiting up and spacewalking in the first place. Remember, they have already had a partial glove failure. The repair itself is not without considerable risk. They have had similar gouges before and the Shuttle has landed perfectly fine. Now is not the time to experiment. They can certainly perform exper
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At _some point_, the returns off of simulations will become les
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And why wouldn't NASA want to perform steps that only increase the chance of a successful landing?
You're a freakin idiot if you think a repair such as this only increases the chances of a successful landing. Maybe if it was a successful repair. On the other hand, a repair attempt could completely fuck up a bunch more tiles than are gouged. A repair attempt could dick up the flow of air around the repair to cause it to heat up more than it would by being left alone. There are a billion reasons an attempted repair could make things worse than they already are.
As for JSC disagreeing, they were the onl
Re:Disaster waiting to happen (Score:5, Insightful)
We seem to have forgotten that in the U.S. lately. Granted, the integrity of the shuttle frame is not worth human life, but the panicked semi-troll responses to this crisis made me realize yet again how far we've fallen as a society.
The same people are "concerned" now, as the ones who were calling for ending the space program after Columbia.
We are so fat and content that we seem to think that anything that interferes with our blissful lives must be a curse. We have forgotten the drive and determination of scientists, engineers, and many others, which made the world we're living in possible. Make no mistake about it - without self-sacrifice, many of the technological and scientific developments that shaped the latter half of the 20th century would not have been possible.
Yet the population, spurred on by the scaremongering media, seem to think that we've now magically gotten to a point at which we can make everything safe. Well... we almost can... if we all just stay home. But if we want another revolution in the development of our species, like the one that spanned 1850-1975, we will have to accept that some things are worth it. Yes, it's important to minimize risk... but sometimes you have to accept a reasonable amount of risk, take a deep breath, and just go.
Anyway, sorry about the rant...
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The problem isn't the risk to people.
The current problem is that making systems that carry people is so expensive it eats up the budget we could be using for unmanned exploration. It ties us to primitive systems and slows development.
No matter how many people we send into space, we'll need advanced unmanned systems to exploit what we find. If we begin by focusing on unmanne
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Cameras can see more than the human eye, and everything we "touch" will be through a barrier such as a glove. If you want tactile feedback, machines can offer that as well.
"Never send a machine to do a man's job."
What job can man do hands-on that must be done for space exploration and is not possible to do by machine?
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Exploring...
I am sure that you have no experience with scientific research, because any researcher will tell you that to do something yourself, or to have a machine do it, is worlds apart.
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Like the Hubble? Oh wait
I blame the ISS more than the shuttle. We could've had more Hubble-like devices out there if we didn't lock ourselves into dedicating all shuttle hours to that boondoggle of Skylab 2 out there.
To properly explore space you can't rely on one thing. Sure, we've got unmanned probes to do amazing things (we being mankind; Japan's asteroid mission
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Which does not, in principle, require humans to do the work. The investment in bringing up humans to fix their appliances could be redirected into more developed, less expensive appliances that are expendable.
Home computers are "maintainable", but they are now so cheap they are routinely thrown away. As we move into space, we'll need lots of expendable hardware to avoid wasting expensive travel time on repairs that may or may not
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I never shifted responsibility to someone ELSE...
I am a medical scientist. I can't say I do it haughtily or foolishly, but I do deal with infectious agents and carcinogens on a daily basis. I've also sacrificed my youth to being stuck in a lab 60-80 h
ROFL (Score:2)
Wake me up when you're actually facing risk at least simil
They weren't (Score:2)
Actually, the whole point is that they weren't.
The problem is that so far in a relatively short interval they had two cuts in two spacesuits' gloves during spacewalks. The last one was a two inch gash, and prompted an immediate abort of the spacewalk. Precisely because noone wants to vaccuum an astronaut.
Now they weren't all the way through the glove. At least the latest one had only cut the top two
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They decided it was not worth risking an astronaut's life to repair the shuttle just to potentially save on repair costs.
In other words THEY ARE MORE CONCERNED WITH LIVES THAN COSTS YOU ASSHOLE.
Re:Disaster waiting to happen (Score:4, Insightful)
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yes (Score:2)
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-->I share that exact memory. And the teachers trying hard to figure out how to explain all that to the students.
Aside from finding out that Vader was Luke's Father, that may have been the biggest WTF! moment of childhood.
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Because every single solitary year, the budget for NASA is drastically reduced...it's at the point now where they are barely able to function.
Instead of investing in exploring the existance that surrounds us, we instead decide that our money is better spent destroying each other. To quote Bill Hicks:
"Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take
Reinvited from the Apollo Era (Score:2)
It sort of has been proposed [wikipedia.org] that the shuttle should be replaced with "more pioneering technology." But you'll notice that the current ideas on the table, specifically the Orion spacecraft, are similar in design to something from the Apollo era with some technology borrowed from the shuttle. What's old is new again, I suppose.
I know, I'm sure you were expecting something S
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NASA flunky: "Hello, is this Canaveral Auto Body?"
CAB: "Speaking."
NASA: "Yes, well, we've kind of thinking about having some body work done on the shuttle. It's in orbit right now. Do you do mobile repairs?"
CAB: "Yeah, we have Bruce Willis. Okay, what you do you need?"
NASA: "Well, we have a little shuttle gouge."
CAB: "Teenage drivers again?"
NASA: "No. What do you think it'll cost?"
CAB: "Insurance?"
NASA: "All State."
CAB: "How big's the gouge?"
NASA: "Couple inches."
CAB:
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