Military Space Plane = Space life boat?

Steve Hix wrote:
In article ,
Alexander wrote:
The X15 was around years before NASA was hatched. NASA was not involved
in that.

NACA studies on hypersonic flight by Walter Dornberger led to the
decision in 1954

You been reading Wiki.. It is incorrect.. Its earlier then that.

to build the X-15. The first unpowered flight was in
June, 1959.


Nope... In the beginning we lost our ass on that.
Time NASA got into the Act Scott Cross field had been dumped from test
pilot status and was Chief of Flight test.


NACA, having been around for about 46 years, became NASA October 1,
1958; lock, stock, barrels and employees.

Still was not involved in the X15. Cheap funding came from Airforce.
Next you will be telling me that Hound dog was a Nasa project too.
Please keep in mind NASA was a space agency.

Except for the newer label, NACA/NASA long predated the X-15.

Rockwells contracts were approved by Congress ... not NASA.

If you're going to be picking nits, it wasn't Rockwell until a long time
later.

Big ****ing deal My Serial there was 5 digits. I bet NASA also was
involved with The Navajo, Minuteman, Ascore, Mark II etc. ;-p

OH lordy don't forget the P51 and that little ole fighter Jet that ruled
the skies over Korea.


NASA was merely a government boondoggle oversite committee.

For all it's problems and failures since Apollo was shut down, and
they're legion, NASA during the earlier years was much more than that.

Nuts.. They ignored every interoffice memo for safety changes on Apollo.
The Hatch problem was designed and boondoggled into be built and the
*******s refused to incorporate until we finally killed someone. We knew
just from the drop towers in Downey that hatch was a pile of ****. Only
thing we didn't design.

At least try to be a bit more honest.

You should try that.. Look up the airframe designers for the X15.
Also try the power plant folks also. NAA was the prime contractor for
space. That meant the research also. I spent many a deafening hour in
the cracked blockhouse at Santa Susana MT and never laid eyes on NASA
Geniuses. I did see Von Braun and some of his lads whisk in and out though.

On Nov 22, 6:41�am, "Ken S. Tucker" wrote:
On Nov 21, 9:06 pm, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:





On Nov 21, 9:43 pm, frank wrote:
On Nov 21, 7:32 pm, Brian Thorn wrote:

On Sat, 21 Nov 2009 19:53:43 -0500, "vaughn"

wrote:

"Gordon" wrote in message
...

Given an unlimited budget, I am sure that is correct. Of course, we may lose
a
crew or 2 as we work out the kinks in a totally new system, just as we have
in
the shuttle. ...But what the hell? At least it would be a NEW and MODERN
system; which, if we are lucky, might work as well as the old one.

Neither STS loss occurred during its trial period, releasing quite a
bit of air out of your point.

Sorry, but I can't agree. Both shuttle accidents uncovered significant flaws in
the design and operation of the shuttle system.

Actually, both accidents were caused by faults known well in advance,
but put on the back-burner because "it's not been a problem before"..
That doesn't sound dramatically different than Russia's lukewarm
responses to the Soyuz ballistic entries.

They were faults that cost the
lives to two entire crews and they were faults that needed correction before
further flight. The simple fact that those faults were not uncovered in the
test period is not relevant

They were. STS-2 had the first o-ring seal problems, and 51-C had the
severe problems during the coldest launch prior to Challenger. Nobody
listened or wanted to put their neck on the line and call for a
standdown to redesign. STS-27 had such serious tile damage from (SRB,
not ET) insulation liberation in 1988 that its Commander did not
expect to survive. STS-112 had a serious ET foam liberation event two
flights before Columbia and NASA was already looking into changes.

Brian

Yup. Rockwell wanted to keep the Shuttle in flight test status after
flight 4, but NASA didn't want to spend the money. Their argument was
the X-15 was always thought of as a test vehicle. NASA said its flown
and came back. There were O Ring burn problems on a lot of flights,
we'd get reports of charred O Rings and since we weren't the
engineers, thought that the guys at the Cape had it under control.
Heads didn't roll after the Challenger explosion except for the
whistle blowers. Thiokol got more bucks, management clapped each other
on the back and got multi thousand bonuses.

As far as the foam, still a problem. That may never really be solvable
except changing flight parameters. Worked on the O rings, hey, if its
freezing remember Feynmanns glass of water.

I'm not sure the new contracting they did with USA Space or whatever
it was instead of all the individual contractors was a good idea
either. But, cheap is good. I'm not sure there's any other place where
you want a tech rep you go anyplace but the original manufacturer or
vendor.

But NASA has turned into a bunch of bean counters, not real engineers..
It pretty much shows.- Hide quoted text -

before columbia there had been major wing damage from foam, near burn
thrus.......

yet management just ignored it.

before columbia I posted about the large number of flying catches,
nearly lost vehicle and crew..... I was called chicken little and
reassured everything was fine. even pad rats said dont worry

I was in orlando waiting for columbias sonic boom that never came.
told my wife when columbia failed to arrive, they are all dead, from
management failure / schedule failure.

it was a terrible day.

Yes, wife and I were watching the tube, and they were 3 minutes
late, she said they were dead, I went into denial, saying 'head winds'
or minor timing error could account for the delay, but after 5 minutes
I got a very bad feeling.
I thought of the families awaiting the glorious Shuttle touch-down
that never happened.

And yes, operating at those energies, any anomally must be
totally understood...
Ken- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

just like climate change / global warming.. when you dont understand a
killer type risk at least respect it/

Google the archives.. I posted BEFORE columbia asking about a shuttle
stuck at station. Was called chicken little, posters here said it was
impossible.

On Nov 22, 4:39 am, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:
On Nov 22, 6:41 am, "Ken S. Tucker" wrote:



On Nov 21, 9:06 pm, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:

On Nov 21, 9:43 pm, frank wrote:
On Nov 21, 7:32 pm, Brian Thorn wrote:

On Sat, 21 Nov 2009 19:53:43 -0500, "vaughn"

wrote:

"Gordon" wrote in message
...

Given an unlimited budget, I am sure that is correct. Of course, we may lose
a
crew or 2 as we work out the kinks in a totally new system, just as we have
in
the shuttle. ...But what the hell? At least it would be a NEW and MODERN
system; which, if we are lucky, might work as well as the old one.

Neither STS loss occurred during its trial period, releasing quite a
bit of air out of your point.

Sorry, but I can't agree. Both shuttle accidents uncovered significant flaws in
the design and operation of the shuttle system.

Actually, both accidents were caused by faults known well in advance,
but put on the back-burner because "it's not been a problem before".
That doesn't sound dramatically different than Russia's lukewarm
responses to the Soyuz ballistic entries.

They were faults that cost the
lives to two entire crews and they were faults that needed correction before
further flight. The simple fact that those faults were not uncovered in the
test period is not relevant

They were. STS-2 had the first o-ring seal problems, and 51-C had the
severe problems during the coldest launch prior to Challenger. Nobody
listened or wanted to put their neck on the line and call for a
standdown to redesign. STS-27 had such serious tile damage from (SRB,
not ET) insulation liberation in 1988 that its Commander did not
expect to survive. STS-112 had a serious ET foam liberation event two
flights before Columbia and NASA was already looking into changes.

Brian

Yup. Rockwell wanted to keep the Shuttle in flight test status after
flight 4, but NASA didn't want to spend the money. Their argument was
the X-15 was always thought of as a test vehicle. NASA said its flown
and came back. There were O Ring burn problems on a lot of flights,
we'd get reports of charred O Rings and since we weren't the
engineers, thought that the guys at the Cape had it under control.
Heads didn't roll after the Challenger explosion except for the
whistle blowers. Thiokol got more bucks, management clapped each other
on the back and got multi thousand bonuses.

As far as the foam, still a problem. That may never really be solvable
except changing flight parameters. Worked on the O rings, hey, if its
freezing remember Feynmanns glass of water.

I'm not sure the new contracting they did with USA Space or whatever
it was instead of all the individual contractors was a good idea
either. But, cheap is good. I'm not sure there's any other place where
you want a tech rep you go anyplace but the original manufacturer or
vendor.

But NASA has turned into a bunch of bean counters, not real engineers.
It pretty much shows.- Hide quoted text -

before columbia there had been major wing damage from foam, near burn
thrus.......

yet management just ignored it.

before columbia I posted about the large number of flying catches,
nearly lost vehicle and crew..... I was called chicken little and
reassured everything was fine. even pad rats said dont worry

I was in orlando waiting for columbias sonic boom that never came.
told my wife when columbia failed to arrive, they are all dead, from
management failure / schedule failure.

it was a terrible day.

Yes, wife and I were watching the tube, and they were 3 minutes
late, she said they were dead, I went into denial, saying 'head winds'
or minor timing error could account for the delay, but after 5 minutes
I got a very bad feeling.
I thought of the families awaiting the glorious Shuttle touch-down
that never happened.

And yes, operating at those energies, any anomally must be
totally understood...
Ken- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

just like climate change / global warming.. when you dont understand a
killer type risk at least respect it/

Google the archives.. I posted BEFORE columbia asking about a shuttle
stuck at station. Was called chicken little, posters here said it was
impossible.

Well perhaps the foam shed problem could be solved by
removing the foam prior to launch, say at t-10 minutes.
Icing would (should) shake off when the SRB's start to
shake the ET. That reduces the weight and drag of the ET.
Ken

On Nov 20, 8:48*pm, Gordon wrote:
On Nov 20, 10:10*pm, Frogwatch wrote:

On Nov 20, 10:27*pm, "David E. Powell"
wrote:

It sounds like the general thrust of the stuff discussed on here a
couple months back, it could be a neat "on call" rescue launcher!

I thought that was what soyuz was for.

Yes, but wouldn;t a modern lifeboat be preferable to a 50 year old
design? *We need to upgrade at some point, why not now? *The shuttle
is fork-tender - its a new era in US space travel and relying on that
rickety old Soviet ball in an emergency doesn't mesh with fielding a
brand new generation of heavy lift vehicle for the push towards a moon
base and ultimately the jump to Mars. *Time to upgrade.

v/r Gordon

What's a really good interplanetary shuttle (half again or twice the
volumetric size of the existing shuttle, and its 100 tonne payload
capacity) packing a nuclear reactor (actually as being pulled or
pushed by as an external reactor/thruster module that would otherwise
remain in LEO) with those multiple MW ion thrusters, going to cost us?

With a sufficient cache of onboard or external energy (reactor or
possibly solar derived), most any fuel or substance can be utilized
for ion thrusting, especially nifty and extremely dense as well as
already charged up and ready to zip out the exhaust would be radon
(Rn222), as obtained from a few kgtonne of radium that could
otherwise be utilized as is within the reactor.

Btw; our moon should have loads of radium.

~ BG

On Nov 22, 10:41�am, BradGuth wrote:
On Nov 20, 8:48�pm, Gordon wrote:





On Nov 20, 10:10�pm, Frogwatch wrote:

On Nov 20, 10:27�pm, "David E. Powell"
wrote:

It sounds like the general thrust of the stuff discussed on here a
couple months back, it could be a neat "on call" rescue launcher!

I thought that was what soyuz was for.

Yes, but wouldn;t a modern lifeboat be preferable to a 50 year old
design? �We need to upgrade at some point, why not now? �The shuttle
is fork-tender - its a new era in US space travel and relying on that
rickety old Soviet ball in an emergency doesn't mesh with fielding a
brand new generation of heavy lift vehicle for the push towards a moon
base and ultimately the jump to Mars. �Time to upgrade.

v/r Gordon

What's a really good interplanetary shuttle (half again or twice the
volumetric size of the existing shuttle, and its 100 tonne payload
capacity) packing a nuclear reactor (actually as being pulled or
pushed by as an external reactor/thruster module that would otherwise
remain in LEO) with those multiple MW ion thrusters, going to cost us?

With a sufficient cache of onboard or external energy (reactor or
possibly solar derived), most any fuel or substance can be utilized
for ion thrusting, especially nifty and extremely dense as well as
already charged up and ready to zip out the exhaust would be radon
(Rn222), as obtained from a few kgtonne of radium that could
otherwise be utilized as is within the reactor.

Btw; �our moon should have loads of radium.

�~ BG- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

oh yeah take WINGS on a mission with no where to use them but a
landing strip on the earth,

Ken S. Tucker wrote:
On Nov 22, 4:39 am, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:
On Nov 22, 6:41 am, "Ken S. Tucker" wrote:



On Nov 21, 9:06 pm, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:
On Nov 21, 9:43 pm, frank wrote:
On Nov 21, 7:32 pm, Brian Thorn wrote:
On Sat, 21 Nov 2009 19:53:43 -0500, "vaughn"
wrote:
"Gordon" wrote in message
...
Given an unlimited budget, I am sure that is correct. Of course, we may lose
a
crew or 2 as we work out the kinks in a totally new system, just as we have
in
the shuttle. ...But what the hell? At least it would be a NEW and MODERN
system; which, if we are lucky, might work as well as the old one.
Neither STS loss occurred during its trial period, releasing quite a
bit of air out of your point.
Sorry, but I can't agree. Both shuttle accidents uncovered significant flaws in
the design and operation of the shuttle system.
Actually, both accidents were caused by faults known well in advance,
but put on the back-burner because "it's not been a problem before".
That doesn't sound dramatically different than Russia's lukewarm
responses to the Soyuz ballistic entries.
They were faults that cost the
lives to two entire crews and they were faults that needed correction before
further flight. The simple fact that those faults were not uncovered in the
test period is not relevant
They were. STS-2 had the first o-ring seal problems, and 51-C had the
severe problems during the coldest launch prior to Challenger. Nobody
listened or wanted to put their neck on the line and call for a
standdown to redesign. STS-27 had such serious tile damage from (SRB,
not ET) insulation liberation in 1988 that its Commander did not
expect to survive. STS-112 had a serious ET foam liberation event two
flights before Columbia and NASA was already looking into changes.
Brian
Yup. Rockwell wanted to keep the Shuttle in flight test status after
flight 4, but NASA didn't want to spend the money. Their argument was
the X-15 was always thought of as a test vehicle. NASA said its flown
and came back. There were O Ring burn problems on a lot of flights,
we'd get reports of charred O Rings and since we weren't the
engineers, thought that the guys at the Cape had it under control.
Heads didn't roll after the Challenger explosion except for the
whistle blowers. Thiokol got more bucks, management clapped each other
on the back and got multi thousand bonuses.
As far as the foam, still a problem. That may never really be solvable
except changing flight parameters. Worked on the O rings, hey, if its
freezing remember Feynmanns glass of water.
I'm not sure the new contracting they did with USA Space or whatever
it was instead of all the individual contractors was a good idea
either. But, cheap is good. I'm not sure there's any other place where
you want a tech rep you go anyplace but the original manufacturer or
vendor.
But NASA has turned into a bunch of bean counters, not real engineers.
It pretty much shows.- Hide quoted text -
before columbia there had been major wing damage from foam, near burn
thrus.......
yet management just ignored it.
before columbia I posted about the large number of flying catches,
nearly lost vehicle and crew..... I was called chicken little and
reassured everything was fine. even pad rats said dont worry
I was in orlando waiting for columbias sonic boom that never came.
told my wife when columbia failed to arrive, they are all dead, from
management failure / schedule failure.
it was a terrible day.
Yes, wife and I were watching the tube, and they were 3 minutes
late, she said they were dead, I went into denial, saying 'head winds'
or minor timing error could account for the delay, but after 5 minutes
I got a very bad feeling.
I thought of the families awaiting the glorious Shuttle touch-down
that never happened.
And yes, operating at those energies, any anomally must be
totally understood...
Ken- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -
just like climate change / global warming.. when you dont understand a
killer type risk at least respect it/

Google the archives.. I posted BEFORE columbia asking about a shuttle
stuck at station. Was called chicken little, posters here said it was
impossible.

Well perhaps the foam shed problem could be solved by
removing the foam prior to launch, say at t-10 minutes.
Icing would (should) shake off when the SRB's start to
shake the ET. That reduces the weight and drag of the ET.
Ken

And just how much time would scraping the foam require? For that
matter, the crew doing the scraping would probably be somewhat
interested in surviving the launch sequence so they would prefer being a
couple kilometers away from the shuttle at the time.

Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired

bob haller safety advocate wrote:
On Nov 22, 10:41�am, BradGuth wrote:
On Nov 20, 8:48�pm, Gordon wrote:





On Nov 20, 10:10�pm, Frogwatch wrote:
On Nov 20, 10:27�pm, "David E. Powell"
wrote:
It sounds like the general thrust of the stuff discussed on here a
couple months back, it could be a neat "on call" rescue launcher!
I thought that was what soyuz was for.
Yes, but wouldn;t a modern lifeboat be preferable to a 50 year old
design? �We need to upgrade at some point, why not now? �The shuttle
is fork-tender - its a new era in US space travel and relying on that
rickety old Soviet ball in an emergency doesn't mesh with fielding a
brand new generation of heavy lift vehicle for the push towards a moon
base and ultimately the jump to Mars. �Time to upgrade.
v/r Gordon
What's a really good interplanetary shuttle (half again or twice the
volumetric size of the existing shuttle, and its 100 tonne payload
capacity) packing a nuclear reactor (actually as being pulled or
pushed by as an external reactor/thruster module that would otherwise
remain in LEO) with those multiple MW ion thrusters, going to cost us?

With a sufficient cache of onboard or external energy (reactor or
possibly solar derived), most any fuel or substance can be utilized
for ion thrusting, especially nifty and extremely dense as well as
already charged up and ready to zip out the exhaust would be radon
(Rn222), as obtained from a few kgtonne of radium that could
otherwise be utilized as is within the reactor.

Btw; �our moon should have loads of radium.

�~ BG- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

oh yeah take WINGS on a mission with no where to use them but a
landing strip on the earth,


If you do some research on guth's posts you will find this is one of
his typical ideas. Guth world has nothing to do with reality.

Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired

On Nov 21, 8:43*pm, frank wrote:
On Nov 21, 7:32*pm, Brian Thorn wrote:





On Sat, 21 Nov 2009 19:53:43 -0500, "vaughn"

wrote:

"Gordon" wrote in message
....

Given an unlimited budget, I am sure that is correct. Of course, we may lose
a
crew or 2 as we work out the kinks in a totally new system, just as we have
in
the shuttle. ...But what the hell? At least it would be a NEW and MODERN
system; which, if we are lucky, might work as well as the old one.

Neither STS loss occurred during its trial period, releasing quite a
bit of air out of your point.

Sorry, but I can't agree. *Both shuttle accidents uncovered significant flaws in
the design and operation of the shuttle system.

Actually, both accidents were caused by faults known well in advance,
but put on the back-burner because "it's not been a problem before".
That doesn't sound dramatically different than Russia's lukewarm
responses to the Soyuz ballistic entries.

They were faults that cost the
lives to two entire crews and they were faults that needed correction before
further flight. *The simple fact that those faults were not uncovered in the
test period is not relevant

They were. STS-2 had the first o-ring seal problems, and 51-C had the
severe problems during the coldest launch prior to Challenger. Nobody
listened or wanted to put their neck on the line and call for a
standdown to redesign. STS-27 had such serious tile damage from (SRB,
not ET) insulation liberation in 1988 that its Commander did not
expect to survive. STS-112 had a serious ET foam liberation event two
flights before Columbia and NASA was already looking into changes.

Brian

Yup. Rockwell wanted to keep the Shuttle in flight test status after
flight 4, but NASA didn't want to spend the money. Their argument was
the X-15 was always thought of as a test vehicle. NASA said its flown
and came back. There were O Ring burn problems on a lot of flights,
we'd get reports of charred O Rings and since we weren't the
engineers, thought that the guys at the Cape had it under control.
Heads didn't roll after the Challenger explosion except for the
whistle blowers. Thiokol got more bucks, management clapped each other
on the back and got multi thousand bonuses.

As far as the foam, still a problem. That may never really be solvable
except changing flight parameters. Worked on the O rings, hey, if its
freezing remember Feynmanns glass of water.

Bless you for remembering Dick's attempt to inject realism into the
debate. His personal report on the loss of Challenger was a
refreshing blast of facts amid all the finger pointing and denials.

v/r Gordon

On Nov 22, 11:09 am, Dan wrote:
Ken S. Tucker wrote:
On Nov 22, 4:39 am, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:
On Nov 22, 6:41 am, "Ken S. Tucker" wrote:

On Nov 21, 9:06 pm, bob haller safety advocate
wrote:
On Nov 21, 9:43 pm, frank wrote:
On Nov 21, 7:32 pm, Brian Thorn wrote:
On Sat, 21 Nov 2009 19:53:43 -0500, "vaughn"
wrote:
"Gordon" wrote in message
...
Given an unlimited budget, I am sure that is correct. Of course, we may lose
a
crew or 2 as we work out the kinks in a totally new system, just as we have
in
the shuttle. ...But what the hell? At least it would be a NEW and MODERN
system; which, if we are lucky, might work as well as the old one.
Neither STS loss occurred during its trial period, releasing quite a
bit of air out of your point.
Sorry, but I can't agree. Both shuttle accidents uncovered significant flaws in
the design and operation of the shuttle system.
Actually, both accidents were caused by faults known well in advance,
but put on the back-burner because "it's not been a problem before".
That doesn't sound dramatically different than Russia's lukewarm
responses to the Soyuz ballistic entries.
They were faults that cost the
lives to two entire crews and they were faults that needed correction before
further flight. The simple fact that those faults were not uncovered in the
test period is not relevant
They were. STS-2 had the first o-ring seal problems, and 51-C had the
severe problems during the coldest launch prior to Challenger. Nobody
listened or wanted to put their neck on the line and call for a
standdown to redesign. STS-27 had such serious tile damage from (SRB,
not ET) insulation liberation in 1988 that its Commander did not
expect to survive. STS-112 had a serious ET foam liberation event two
flights before Columbia and NASA was already looking into changes.
Brian
Yup. Rockwell wanted to keep the Shuttle in flight test status after
flight 4, but NASA didn't want to spend the money. Their argument was
the X-15 was always thought of as a test vehicle. NASA said its flown
and came back. There were O Ring burn problems on a lot of flights,
we'd get reports of charred O Rings and since we weren't the
engineers, thought that the guys at the Cape had it under control.
Heads didn't roll after the Challenger explosion except for the
whistle blowers. Thiokol got more bucks, management clapped each other
on the back and got multi thousand bonuses.
As far as the foam, still a problem. That may never really be solvable
except changing flight parameters. Worked on the O rings, hey, if its
freezing remember Feynmanns glass of water.
I'm not sure the new contracting they did with USA Space or whatever
it was instead of all the individual contractors was a good idea
either. But, cheap is good. I'm not sure there's any other place where
you want a tech rep you go anyplace but the original manufacturer or
vendor.
But NASA has turned into a bunch of bean counters, not real engineers.
It pretty much shows.- Hide quoted text -
before columbia there had been major wing damage from foam, near burn
thrus.......
yet management just ignored it.
before columbia I posted about the large number of flying catches,
nearly lost vehicle and crew..... I was called chicken little and
reassured everything was fine. even pad rats said dont worry
I was in orlando waiting for columbias sonic boom that never came.
told my wife when columbia failed to arrive, they are all dead, from
management failure / schedule failure.
it was a terrible day.
Yes, wife and I were watching the tube, and they were 3 minutes
late, she said they were dead, I went into denial, saying 'head winds'
or minor timing error could account for the delay, but after 5 minutes
I got a very bad feeling.
I thought of the families awaiting the glorious Shuttle touch-down
that never happened.
And yes, operating at those energies, any anomally must be
totally understood...
Ken- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -
just like climate change / global warming.. when you dont understand a
killer type risk at least respect it/

Google the archives.. I posted BEFORE columbia asking about a shuttle
stuck at station. Was called chicken little, posters here said it was
impossible.

Well perhaps the foam shed problem could be solved by
removing the foam prior to launch, say at t-10 minutes.
Icing would (should) shake off when the SRB's start to
shake the ET. That reduces the weight and drag of the ET.
Ken

And just how much time would scraping the foam require? For that
matter, the crew doing the scraping would probably be somewhat
interested in surviving the launch sequence so they would prefer being a
couple kilometers away from the shuttle at the time.
Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired

Well Danelda, make it T-30min, the Engineers Union prevents me
from disclosing details, OT, but I think I'll peel a banana for lunch.
The solution is a win-win, we eliminate the source of the problem,
and by so doing substatially increase the payload by the weight
of the foam.
Ken

"Gordon" wrote in message
...
On Nov 21, 8:43 pm, frank wrote:


As far as the foam, still a problem. That may never really be solvable
except changing flight parameters. Worked on the O rings, hey, if its
freezing remember Feynmanns glass of water.

Bless you for remembering Dick's attempt to inject realism into the
debate. His personal report on the loss of Challenger was a
refreshing blast of facts amid all the finger pointing and denials.

v/r Gordon

It can be tropical and icing could still be a problem, the external tank
does contain cryogenic gases at -400 F when all is said and done.

Keith