Re: [twuug] Space Shuttle Columbia blows up on reentry!

[Charles Shannon Hendrix <shannon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sat, Feb 01, 2003 at 12:39:47PM -0500, Adam Crosby wrote:

> Apparently, the crew ejection system is a hatch on the side of the Shuttle -
> they hook onto a pole, and slide out - triggering their parachutes.
> At Mach18 (it's speed at the moment of lost contact), I don't think there is
> a parachute material available that could survive, let alone the humans
> attached.  The heat around the shuttle at that point of the deorbit burn
> would instantly melt them.

The current system was designed in response to Challenger because the
crew module was intact when it struck water, and they could have survived.

Originally the idea was to have a real ejection system designed for
extreme speed and altitude.  By the time Challenger exploded, there was
nothing availabe, for a variety of reasons.

I'm sure the topic is going to come up now, but I doubt they'd spend
the money to do something that technically difficult, not now anyway.
Then again, they did have at least a simple or preliminary design before,
and maybe they tested it and have some ideas to work on.  I'd hesitate
to say it isn't possible.

Aside: It never ceases to amaze me how stupid the news media is.
Some idiot asked NASA if the shuttle was shot down by a Stinger missile.

We are talking about <5 minutes of Google research to avoid a stupid
question like this.

That wasn't even the dumbest one I heard today.

> I just hope this doesn't put as big a damper on the Space program as the
> Challenger did - although I sadly suspect it will :(

If we really honor those who died today, we'll push even harder.

Death isn't going to go away either, it's likely going to increase,
especially if we tackle Mars.  If we give up every time something bad
happens, we'll never get off this planet.


-- 
UNIX/Perl/C/Pizza____________________s h a n n o n@wido !SPAM maker.com


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