If columbia hadnt been lost would the shuttle still be flying?

On 1/25/2013 2:44 PM, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 6fe074bb-9939-4de2-b04d-51091823da51
@h2g2000yqa.googlegroups.com, says...

At least this will get us something to talk about other than spam

I'd rather let this group rest in peace along with the shuttle program.

Is that why you are posting to sci.space.shuttle?

On Mar 3, 4:13*pm, Taylor Hughes wrote:
On 1/25/2013 2:44 PM, Jeff Findley wrote:

In article 6fe074bb-9939-4de2-b04d-51091823da51
@h2g2000yqa.googlegroups.com, says...

At least this will get us something to talk about other than spam

I'd rather let this group rest in peace along with the shuttle program.

Is that why you are posting to sci.space.shuttle?

I have been posting to scispace shuttle for perhaps 15 years maybe
more

although the program has ended I believe there are still things to
discuss

In article ,
says...

On 1/25/2013 2:44 PM, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 6fe074bb-9939-4de2-b04d-51091823da51
@h2g2000yqa.googlegroups.com, says...

At least this will get us something to talk about other than spam

I'd rather let this group rest in peace along with the shuttle program.

Is that why you are posting to sci.space.shuttle?

To counter Bob's insane rantings about what "could have been". Bob
seems to think the best way to continue the shuttle program would have
been to ground it for five to 10 years while it's completely redesigned
to "make it safer". This is despite the fact that it's clear that NASA
didn't have the money or the political mandate for such a thing.

Jeff
--
"the perennial claim that hypersonic airbreathing propulsion would
magically make space launch cheaper is nonsense -- LOX is much cheaper
than advanced airbreathing engines, and so are the tanks to put it in
and the extra thrust to carry it." - Henry Spencer

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

In article ,
says...

On 1/25/2013 2:44 PM, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 6fe074bb-9939-4de2-b04d-51091823da51
@h2g2000yqa.googlegroups.com, says...

At least this will get us something to talk about other than spam

I'd rather let this group rest in peace along with the shuttle program.

Is that why you are posting to sci.space.shuttle?

To counter Bob's insane rantings about what "could have been". Bob
seems to think the best way to continue the shuttle program would have
been to ground it for five to 10 years while it's completely redesigned
to "make it safer". This is despite the fact that it's clear that NASA
didn't have the money or the political mandate for such a thing.

To be clear, neither Jeff nor I nor others I'm sure are saying, "Eh, let
them die." Safety is an admirable goal. It's a WORTHY goal. One should
never forget about it.

BUT, there will never be perfect safety. There is "safe enough".

Was the space shuttle safe enough to make the JFK-MCO flight with 120
families with kids on board? Hell no. But it didn't HAVE to be.

Could it have been safer? Arguably yes. Could it have been made as safe as
Bob insists. Not in any realistic political environment. And note, that in
both cases, the issue was as much management/cultural influences as it was a
physical cause. (i.e. had NASA not been so accepting of O-ring burn-thrus or
foam detachment as they were we might still have Challenger and Columbia.)

I'm reminded of two folks:
Mike Rowe on Dirty Jobs. He did a great episode entitled I believe,
"Safety Third". He point was that while safety was critical to all the
myriad jobs he had done over the years, if safety was truly first, some of
them would never get done. (look at Alaska king crab fishermen. Or flight
paramedics here in the US).

And this:

http://www.skygod.com/quotes/ballsto...realworld.html

tl;dr - Mary Shafer: "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't
have the balls to live in the real world."

I suspect Bob has never been in the position where his decisions could
result in the direct result of a loss of life. I'm not talking about
"getting into a car" but decisions such as "calling off a search for missing
canoeists" or "putting 1 or more people on a rope over the edge of a cliff"
type decisions.

Others here I'm sure have at some point in their engineer careers have had
to tell someone "these are the risks, here's my recommendation" knowing that
their information and their decision could result in the loss of life. This
is never done lightly. By as Mary points out, if you play "what if" you
start to go down a road where nothing happens. Or if you insist on "perfect
safety" you never fly.

My heart goes out to the families of the astronauts who have died. But,
they did know the risks. It's not quite the same as a family of four
hopping aboard the 4:15 shuttle and being deluded by its safety.



Jeff

--
Greg D. Moore http://greenmountainsoftware.wordpress.com/
CEO QuiCR: Quick, Crowdsourced Responses. http://www.quicr.net

In article ,
says...

And this:

http://www.skygod.com/quotes/ballsto...realworld.html

tl;dr - Mary Shafer: "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't
have the balls to live in the real world."

One of the best Mary Shafer quotes.

I suspect Bob has never been in the position where his decisions could
result in the direct result of a loss of life. I'm not talking about
"getting into a car" but decisions such as "calling off a search for missing
canoeists" or "putting 1 or more people on a rope over the edge of a cliff"
type decisions.

Loss of life of a customer due to a malfunctioning copier or laminator
would certainly be a career ending event for the repairman who screwed
the pooch. But this is sci.space.shuttle, so Bob's professional
experience doesn't directly apply.

Others here I'm sure have at some point in their engineer careers have
had
to tell someone "these are the risks, here's my recommendation" knowing that
their information and their decision could result in the loss of life. This
is never done lightly. By as Mary points out, if you play "what if" you
start to go down a road where nothing happens. Or if you insist on "perfect
safety" you never fly.

Since my career has involved writing engineering software, I've never
faced this sort of situation either. But quality of the software is
still very important. After all, we wouldn't want a customer who's
using our software to make a mistake due to a software bug.

My heart goes out to the families of the astronauts who have died. But,
they did know the risks. It's not quite the same as a family of four
hopping aboard the 4:15 shuttle and being deluded by its safety.

Agreed, just as other dangerous careers have their well known risks,
astronaut is no exception.

Jeff
--
"the perennial claim that hypersonic airbreathing propulsion would
magically make space launch cheaper is nonsense -- LOX is much cheaper
than advanced airbreathing engines, and so are the tanks to put it in
and the extra thrust to carry it." - Henry Spencer

In article om,
says...

On 13-03-04 07:33, Jeff Findley wrote:

been to ground it for five to 10 years while it's completely redesigned
to "make it safer". This is despite the fact that it's clear that NASA
didn't have the money or the political mandate for such a thing.

At this point in time, one can use hindsight to see what might have been
done.

NASA had many plans for shuttle improvements. They also developped new
shields etc.

Perhaps they should have grounded the fleet for a full year just prior
to start of ISS assembly (and take advantage of russian delays) to
retrofit one or 2 orbiters during major maintenance cycle with the new
heat shield tech etc.

Those were mostly incremental changes to subsystems. Bob is proposing
wholesale redesign to include launch escape. This was looked at, but
quickly rejected since this would *not* be a relatively straight
forward, incremental, upgrade.

Remember that the argument was that by grounding the shuttle, the
money
saved was to pay for CEV. Perhaps the same logic could have been used to
upgrade the shuttles.

By that time, it was well known what many of the upgrades would cost.
In fact, many of the planned upgrades were canceled because they were
becoming too expensive (e.g. electric APU's and/or electrically operated
SSME gimballing and aero surfaces).

Because Columbia resulted in the EOL of the shuttle, NASA was only going
to make the modifications that were absolutely necessary for return to
flight to perform the already scheduled missions.

NASA was already headed down that path. What Columbia did was refocus
the effort onto upgrades which impacted safety more so than long term
affordability of the program.

But had this grounding been done before, perhaps enough improvements
would have been made to make the shuttle worthy of flight for much
longer with significant incremental improvements.

Possibly, but budget constraints were already squeezing the upgrade
programs quite tightly. The space station program was gobbling up too
much funding for many upgrades to be funded.

Jeff
--
"the perennial claim that hypersonic airbreathing propulsion would
magically make space launch cheaper is nonsense -- LOX is much cheaper
than advanced airbreathing engines, and so are the tanks to put it in
and the extra thrust to carry it." - Henry Spencer

"Jeff Findley" wrote in message
...

In article ,
says...

And this:

http://www.skygod.com/quotes/ballsto...realworld.html

tl;dr - Mary Shafer: "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't
have the balls to live in the real world."

One of the best Mary Shafer quotes.


She has a few good ones!


I suspect Bob has never been in the position where his decisions could
result in the direct result of a loss of life. I'm not talking about
"getting into a car" but decisions such as "calling off a search for
missing
canoeists" or "putting 1 or more people on a rope over the edge of a
cliff"
type decisions.

Loss of life of a customer due to a malfunctioning copier or laminator
would certainly be a career ending event for the repairman who screwed
the pooch. But this is sci.space.shuttle, so Bob's professional
experience doesn't directly apply.


No, but my point is broader than that. By day I do IT. But my
extracurricular activities do put me in positions where lives are on the
line.
I highly suspect that Bob has never been in that position, regardless of his
day time job.


Others here I'm sure have at some point in their engineer careers have
had
to tell someone "these are the risks, here's my recommendation" knowing
that
their information and their decision could result in the loss of life.
This
is never done lightly. By as Mary points out, if you play "what if" you
start to go down a road where nothing happens. Or if you insist on
"perfect
safety" you never fly.

Since my career has involved writing engineering software, I've never
faced this sort of situation either. But quality of the software is
still very important. After all, we wouldn't want a customer who's
using our software to make a mistake due to a software bug.

Agreed. And I'm reminded of Feynman's comments on the software team at NASA
prior to Challenger.


My heart goes out to the families of the astronauts who have died. But,
they did know the risks. It's not quite the same as a family of four
hopping aboard the 4:15 shuttle and being deluded by its safety.

Agreed, just as other dangerous careers have their well known risks,
astronaut is no exception.


Ayup.


Jeff

--
Greg D. Moore http://greenmountainsoftware.wordpress.com/
CEO QuiCR: Quick, Crowdsourced Responses. http://www.quicr.net

In article om, JF Mezei wrote:
On 13-03-04 07:33, Jeff Findley wrote:

been to ground it for five to 10 years while it's completely redesigned
to "make it safer". This is despite the fact that it's clear that NASA
didn't have the money or the political mandate for such a thing.

At this point in time, one can use hindsight to see what might have been
done.

NASA had many plans for shuttle improvements. They also developped new
shields etc.

Perhaps they should have grounded the fleet for a full year just prior
to start of ISS assembly (and take advantage of russian delays) to
retrofit one or 2 orbiters during major maintenance cycle with the new
heat shield tech etc.

Remember that the argument was that by grounding the shuttle, the money
saved was to pay for CEV. Perhaps the same logic could have been used to
upgrade the shuttles.

but part of me thinks the Shuttle continued in a way because whilst it was
still launching & building the ISS (which we can debate was a role to give the
Shuttle something to do) there was some purpose to it, it wasnt perfect but it
was filling a launch capability NASA required,.it meant they didnt pursue a
whole bundle of other stuff as a result, but it meant we could launch to the
ISS and do stuff with it,

as soon as you stop though, and step back and ask the question ok what upgrade
do we need to fix on the Shuttle, you dont end up with an upgraded Shuttle IMO
you shouldnt end up with an Apollo retread either, but the Shuttle design was
such a compromise of competing requirements the majority it never ended up
fulfilling anyway and to continue to fund it and upgrades to it just to keep
it going, to launch to the ISS.

there arefar better ways to get people into space, and its a shame we ended
up so focussed on delivering to the idiosynchracies of the Shuttle in the end
we are virtually back at the beginning again of manned space vehicles.

In article om,
says...

On 13-03-05 09:40, Jeff Findley wrote:

Possibly, but budget constraints were already squeezing the upgrade
programs quite tightly. The space station program was gobbling up too
much funding for many upgrades to be funded.

I have to wonder however how much of the "too expensive" portion was due
to how the space business was structured and runned as a way to give
Boeing constant flow of large quantities of PORK leading everything to
be more expensive than it needed to be.

Had Shuttle upgrades been awarded to some private outfit like SpaceX,
would the costs to upgrade to electric hydraulics instead of hydrazine
have been dramatically lower than if done the way NASA had planned to do
it ?

Doubtful since a start-up wouldn't know how to integrate their new gizmo
into the shuttle *system*. Systems engineering is a p.i.t.a. and doubly
so if you didn't design the original system.

Jeff
--
"the perennial claim that hypersonic airbreathing propulsion would
magically make space launch cheaper is nonsense -- LOX is much cheaper
than advanced airbreathing engines, and so are the tanks to put it in
and the extra thrust to carry it." - Henry Spencer

On Mar 14, 12:33*pm, JF Mezei wrote:
I know this is all in hindsight...

NASA had wanted to go with electric hydraulics for some time.

Boeing now has electric hydraulics on its commercial 787 plane.

I realise that moving to electric also probably means beefing up the
electric power supply for the shuttle. However, from the hydraulic
systems point of view, could the 787 hydraulic pumps be used on the
shuttle ?

If NASA still has to design them from scratch due to harsher
environment, would the Boeing experience with electric hydraulic make a
significant difference in lowering the costs of this conversion ?

Probably, although scaled up.....

Its sad if the shuttle had LFBB and other upgrades probably model 2 it
could till be flying today and a version used for heavy lift...

part of the problem was not designing the shuttle or a version for
unmanned or minimally manned...