On Sat, 31 Jul 2010 04:17:05 -0800, Pat Flannery
wrote:


What Shuttle didn't get right was the need for acceptable weather at KSC
for a RTLS abort, and on the far side of the Atlantic for sub-orbital
aborts

True, but in the end those limitations didn't have much impact,
because Shuttle flight-rate never rose high enough for the diverted
landings to significantly affect schedules.

Not even to mention all the Shuttle returns that were delayed in landing
at KSC or went to Edwards as a alternate landing site due to weather
problems at KSC.

Ditto.

That's something that needs correcting on a future launch system;

Why? It would be enormously expensive to build an all-weather
spacecraft, and that will saddle the spacecraft with lots of heavy
'extras' that simply delaying launch or landing 24 hours usually
obviates.

We don't let airliners take off in bad weather, and we divert
airliners to other airports if the weather gets too bad to land, why
demand more of a spacecraft that is unlikely to fly more often than
once every couple of weeks anyway?

We need simpler spacecraft, not more complicated ones.

Brian