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It was a failed o-ring from launching in too cold of temperatures that caused the Challenger disaster though, not a failure of the rocket fuel. The engineers t
by qbasic_forever 4y ago
It was a failed o-ring from launching in too cold of temperatures that caused the Challenger disaster though, not a failure of the rocket fuel. The engineers that understood the danger to the o-rings objected to the launch and would not sign off on it, but they were overruled by NASA's broken management culture at the time and the rest is history. There was a thorough investigation and it placed the blame squarely on NASA management for the root cause of launching under conditions that were dangerous to the shuttle design.
- tsimionescu 4y agoThis was the investigation largely carried out by Richard Feynman, who ignored much of the other investigators to actually get to the root of the issue.
- mavhc 4y agoThe real question is why they had o-rings. Because it was built in parts. Why was it built in parts? Because it was built in Utah.
- jxramos 4y agoThis is a reference to it requiring shipment to the launch site right? That shipment was more practical under bite sized chunks no?
- mavhc 4y agoYep, shipped by rail, so that jobs were more evenly distributed, and thus cost twice as much, worked half as well, and killed way more people
- JoeDaDude 4y agoThis sounds like a good time to insert the very old joke about how the size of a horse's ass determined the size of the booster rockets. https://cs.trains.com/trn/f/111/t/256024.aspx https://cs.trains.com/trn/f/111/t/256024.aspx
- LanceH 4y agoBuilt in as many congressional districts as possible for "job creation"
- rootusrootus 4y agoAnd because the Shuttle had two launch sites, one on either coast. And because the different segments had different propellant profiles for different stages of flight. And because inspection and manufacturing in segments is a lot easier.