Columbia shuttle lost Part II

[Asher]

You guys should be ashamed...

[Az]

I thought you were all for tasteless jokes, Siro.

Where is your sporting spirit?

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by Odin
You know, I have a crazy idea. Lets have private companies do the earth orbit suff and let NASA concentrate on space stations, space telescopes and space exploration.

Plus we should triple NASA funding. I WANT TO GO TO MARS AND LOOK FOR LIFE!!!

I dont think a private company would have a chance in hell to stay in business (as it would be difficult to make money) without massive government subsidies.

I would like to go to mars as well. And colonize the moon... numerous theoretically self-sufficient colony designs have been invented. A moon colony could even maybe be profitable. A profitable mars colony is a ways off however. The two moons of mars are thought to be very mineral rich tho, mining among other things might make it profitable in the distant future.

[Ned]

That story on the fragility of the tiles makes the NASA statement that they felt that the insulation impact on the shuttle's left had caused only minor damage simple INCREDIBLE.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Ned
That story on the fragility of the tiles makes the NASA statement that they felt that the insulation impact on the shuttle's left had caused only minor damage simple INCREDIBLE.

It's normal for some tiles to fall off during every flight.

[Zylka]

take ur pills, "MAN"...

I thought you were all for tasteless jokes, Siro.

Where is your sporting spirit?

I don't have so much a problem with these jokes being tasteless as I do their being completely f*cking retarded. What kind of standards do you have to laugh at this talentless garbage? It's about as funny as a comic with Bush pissing on the Earth with sidestrips commenting on iconographically unreleated topics

OH WAIT, HOLY F*CK THAT IS PRETTY FUNNY - KEEP EM COMING GUYS!!!

[DanS]

I dont think a private company would have a chance in hell to stay in business (as it would be difficult to make money) without massive government subsidies.

No, it's not that. The government intends to continue to be the #1 customer for space launch, and especially human space flight.

I was involved in the early stages of VentureStar, promoting private financing of the next generation shuttle (X-33). The US Government decided to squash plans to partially privately finance the program, because (I'm convinced) they would lose control over space launch and human space flight. It gets into a lot of far out, national security, Buck Rogers stuff.

In their view, it is better to have an incredibly expensive, bloated program that they control.

[Ned]

From another story on CNN,

"On the most recent, fatal flight, NASA technicians reviewing video noticed that a number of heat insulation tiles seemed to have fallen off from one of the wings during the shuttle's eight-minute race to orbit. "

I found one other story that said a single tile had fallen off on one other mission and that underlying aluminum superstructure had melted. But it was not in a critical location.

But the first thing to go were the hydrolic sensors. I understand that the hydrolic system on the shuttle uses hydrazine, which is explosive. It seems likely that something blew up an ripped a hole in the wing, causing further tiles to fall off until the wing disintegrated.

So, they knew tiles had fallen off and were gambling on re-entry.

The Columbia apparently was the only shuttle that did not have an ISS docking mechanism. Still, I am sure the astronauts could have gotten on board somehow while NASA figured out how to fix the shuttle - or better, bring it down unmanned. They just gambled and lost.

[Az]

"On the most recent, fatal flight, NASA technicians reviewing video noticed that a number of heat insulation tiles seemed to have fallen off from one of the wings during the shuttle's eight-minute race to orbit. "

oh gawd. I guess there is your problem.

I don't think they should gamble with people's lives like that.

[DanS]

Wait a sec, is standard rocket launch cheaper than via Shuttle? wtf would one use a shuttle?

Shuttle costs about $500 million per flight. Standard rockets cost much, much less than that figure, although to be fair, they aren't designed for human space flight.

[Rogan Josh]

As a matter of interest, which is the bigger tragedy: the shuttle crash or the 7 kids killed in the avalanche in BC?

While the shuttle is a tragedy, we should take it in perspective. The fatalities were less than many car crashes, and with all the successful shuttle flights, the shuttle program is still a great success. It would be stupid to shut down the programme for this one accident (even if only temporarily).

[Asher]

Originally posted by Azazel
h gawd. I guess there is your problem.

I don't think they should gamble with people's lives like that.

Mind telling us what else they can do?

The Columbia can't dock, it has a limited supply of fuel and food and the like...

The only way to get out is to get back down to earth.

[Zylka]

...and the astronauts died living their dreams. Those kids died in a confusing, retarded time of life. They didn't marry, nor have children - probably hadn't fallen in love.

Wasn't there another magical 7 death disaster somewhere?

[Ben Kenobi]

And colonize the moon... numerous theoretically self-sufficient colony designs have been invented.

-Kramerman

Key word here is 'theoretical.'

Self-sufficient is a pretty big claim, I could see colonies supplied with food and water from earth, but not self-sufficient.

We don't even know how to make a biodome here on Earth.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
As a matter of interest, which is the bigger tragedy: the shuttle crash or the 7 kids killed in the avalanche in BC?

While the shuttle is a tragedy, we should take it in perspective. The fatalities were less than many car crashes, and with all the successful shuttle flights, the shuttle program is still a great success. It would be stupid to shut down the programme for this one accident (even if only temporarily).

IMO, the avalanche in BC was a bigger tragedy, while the shuttle crash is far more important to the world.

The 7 kids in BC were only in 10th grade, were on a school trip, were in an area popular with tourists and certainly not offlimits, and cross-country skiing. Half of the kids who left on that trip won't ever come back. They didn't accept the risks like the astronauts did, and these kids were so much younger. To me, that's a greater tragedy.

But the shuttle accident, aside from the loss of the people on board, is important because it puts into question NASA's future...