On Tue, 20 Jan 2009 20:27:59 -0500, in a place far, far away, "Greg D.
Moore \(Strider\)" made the phosphor
on my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
...
Prior to the CAIB, did *anyone* ever talk about "certifying" Orbiters,
or is that entirely a post-Columbia phenomenon? Because I can't
recall it in history, and that includes eleven years in Downey in the
eighties.

The reason that I ask is that I've acquired part of the appendix on
the subject on a recent study that NASA did, and wonder if they just
came up with the "certification" language to satisfy the CAIB's
question about flying past 2010. I've never before heard of a
"certification reverification." What is being described here is
basically a reverification.

I've posted the text, with a figure for schedule post 2010, at my
blog.

http://www.transterrestrial.com/?p=16160

My only thought (and I don't have a copy of Jenkin's with me in DC) is that
Jenkin's mentions each airframe is carded at something like a 1.6 load
factor (I may be using the wrong term). But pretty much, the rest seems to
be nebulous numbers like, "100 uses" for the SSME, etc.

The load factor (actually structural safety factor, or margin) is 1.4
(the difference between manned aircraft and rockets, which are less,
but I can't remember the number), but that's not really on point.
Thanks for the try, though.

My thesis is that all this talk about "recertification" of the Shuttle
to fly it past 2010 is post-Columbia hooey, but I'd like to verify
that.