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The sad thing too is that both space shuttle accidents the astronauts knew for seconds to minutes what was happening. NASA isnt making full reports to protect

The sad thing too is that both space shuttle accidents the astronauts knew for seconds to minutes what was happening. NASA isnt making full reports to protect relatives. In either accident the astronauts could not do anything. The new Orion system changes this.

jsprogrammer 11y ago
In what way does the new Orion system change that?
- RIMR 11y ago
  Orion and Dragon capsules have a pad-abort system. In the event of a malfunction, the crew capsule will jettison fast enough to escape any explosions. The acceleration will probably knock out the astronauts and cause internal bleeding, but that's still better than immolation. Failed re-entry is still going to be fatal, but the Dragon can theoretically recover from a failed parachute with its Draco engines.
- zymhan 11y ago
  The issues with having the Space Shuttle slung on the side of the fuel tank, where falling foam could (and did, many times before Columbia) strike the Shuttle.
secstate 11y ago
Oh, for Columbia's crew it could have been far worse than that. There's reasonable evidence [0] that the director of NASA and ground crews knew the Columbia's wing damage was bad enough to make re-entry impossible. But they had two options, tell the astronauts they were never coming home at the start of their mission, or wait until they discovered it minutes before their vehicle disintegrated. The director chose the former path, and ended up getting fired as it looked like a cover up. It was really just being compassionate. No pad abort system would have saved Columbia. But on the flip-side, while everyone is up and arms over the loss, NASA's astronauts are trained to WANT to fly. We can hem and haw and say what a tragedy, but there is a class of people who know the risks, who know the possibility of death always exists and will still pilot or crew the vehicles that we send into space. 0: http://goo.gl/vdagzb http://goo.gl/vdagzb
- pja 11y ago
  I wouldn’t place any trust in the Daily Mail whatsoever. Do you have a more reliable link? As far as I’m aware, NASA knew that there had been a foam / ice strike on the orbiter but had no idea how bad it was. Given those circumstances, why tell the astronauts about a theoretical risk (that turned out to be very real) ?
- zipwitch 11y ago
  NASA had third and fourth options as well. Have the Columbia crew patch the hole and pray while doing what little they could to reduce stress and heating on the damaged wing during re-entry, or expedite Atlantis' next launch as a rescue mission (there would have been something like a four-day margin for launching it without skipping safety checks before Columbia ran out of consumables).
  - DiabloD3 11y ago
    Five days, and they could have expedited it without skipping safety checks.
- knowaveragejoe 11y ago
  Do you have a source besides the Daily Mail? There are other ways to get astronauts back from the ISS, if they knew about the issue ahead of time.
  - mikeash 11y ago
    Columbia's last mission wasn't an ISS mission. They had a pretty limited amount of time before it became hard to breathe. There was a potential rescue option in the form of Atlantis which was already being prepped for another mission and could have been redirected to pick up the Columbia astronauts, but it would have been a big rush and would have required getting things rolling fairly rapidly after they became aware of the ice strike.
- DiabloD3 11y ago
  Except that is entirely bullshit. The reason everyone is up in arms, still to this day, about the Columbia "accident" is because we could have sent a second shuttle to retrieve them very easily. NASA engineers were fighting the decision for the Columbia to return because they already were assembling a plan to get them home alive. Seven astronauts died because Bush put Sean O'Keefe in as Administrator of NASA, and Sean O'Keefe decided it'd cost NASA less money to let the astronauts die instead of bringing them back alive. Sean O'Keefe personally tried to halt any work on sending Atlantis up as a rescue mission, and ended up succeeding, all in the name of budgetary concerns. He didn't give a fuck about those astronauts. And to him? It was just a revolving door. He's now working some cushy job at Airbus as their US CEO, a military contractor he made friends with when he worked for the DoD and was Secretary of the Navy (under Bush's father, the other President Bush). So, fuck him. This wasn't an accident, this was murder for profit.

jsprogrammer 11y ago

In what way does the new Orion system change that?

RIMR 11y ago
Orion and Dragon capsules have a pad-abort system. In the event of a malfunction, the crew capsule will jettison fast enough to escape any explosions. The acceleration will probably knock out the astronauts and cause internal bleeding, but that's still better than immolation. Failed re-entry is still going to be fatal, but the Dragon can theoretically recover from a failed parachute with its Draco engines.
zymhan 11y ago
The issues with having the Space Shuttle slung on the side of the fuel tank, where falling foam could (and did, many times before Columbia) strike the Shuttle.

secstate 11y ago

Oh, for Columbia's crew it could have been far worse than that. There's reasonable evidence [0] that the director of NASA and ground crews knew the Columbia's wing damage was bad enough to make re-entry impossible. But they had two options, tell the astronauts they were never coming home at the start of their mission, or wait until they discovered it minutes before their vehicle disintegrated. The director chose the former path, and ended up getting fired as it looked like a cover up. It was really just being compassionate. No pad abort system would have saved Columbia. But on the flip-side, while everyone is up and arms over the loss, NASA's astronauts are trained to WANT to fly. We can hem and haw and say what a tragedy, but there is a class of people who know the risks, who know the possibility of death always exists and will still pilot or crew the vehicles that we send into space. 0: http://goo.gl/vdagzb http://goo.gl/vdagzb

pja 11y ago
I wouldn’t place any trust in the Daily Mail whatsoever. Do you have a more reliable link? As far as I’m aware, NASA knew that there had been a foam / ice strike on the orbiter but had no idea how bad it was. Given those circumstances, why tell the astronauts about a theoretical risk (that turned out to be very real) ?
zipwitch 11y ago
NASA had third and fourth options as well. Have the Columbia crew patch the hole and pray while doing what little they could to reduce stress and heating on the damaged wing during re-entry, or expedite Atlantis' next launch as a rescue mission (there would have been something like a four-day margin for launching it without skipping safety checks before Columbia ran out of consumables).
- DiabloD3 11y ago
  Five days, and they could have expedited it without skipping safety checks.
knowaveragejoe 11y ago
Do you have a source besides the Daily Mail? There are other ways to get astronauts back from the ISS, if they knew about the issue ahead of time.
- mikeash 11y ago
  Columbia's last mission wasn't an ISS mission. They had a pretty limited amount of time before it became hard to breathe. There was a potential rescue option in the form of Atlantis which was already being prepped for another mission and could have been redirected to pick up the Columbia astronauts, but it would have been a big rush and would have required getting things rolling fairly rapidly after they became aware of the ice strike.
DiabloD3 11y ago
Except that is entirely bullshit. The reason everyone is up in arms, still to this day, about the Columbia "accident" is because we could have sent a second shuttle to retrieve them very easily. NASA engineers were fighting the decision for the Columbia to return because they already were assembling a plan to get them home alive. Seven astronauts died because Bush put Sean O'Keefe in as Administrator of NASA, and Sean O'Keefe decided it'd cost NASA less money to let the astronauts die instead of bringing them back alive. Sean O'Keefe personally tried to halt any work on sending Atlantis up as a rescue mission, and ended up succeeding, all in the name of budgetary concerns. He didn't give a fuck about those astronauts. And to him? It was just a revolving door. He's now working some cushy job at Airbus as their US CEO, a military contractor he made friends with when he worked for the DoD and was Secretary of the Navy (under Bush's father, the other President Bush). So, fuck him. This wasn't an accident, this was murder for profit.