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NEWS: NASA Targets March Launch for Space Shuttle - Reuters



 
 
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Old September 8th 03, 09:52 PM
Rusty B
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Default NEWS: NASA Targets March Launch for Space Shuttle - Reuters

NASA Targets March Launch for Space Shuttle

Mon September 8, 2003 02:56 PM ET
By Jeff Franks

HOUSTON (Reuters) - NASA on Monday set a March launch date for the
first space shuttle flight since the Columbia disaster, but added that
safety, not schedule requirements, would decide when the shuttle goes
into space.

The national space agency, in a 78-page blueprint for its return to
flight, also vowed to redesign the shuttle to make it safer and to
change its own culture to improve communication and encourage
dissenting views.

"We will be safety driven and not schedule driven. We will be
milestone driven and not schedule driven," NASA associate
administrator William Readdy said in a news conference at the Johnson
Space Center.

"There's a challenge there. There's very much a can-do culture that
we'd like to keep. There was a culture that stifled communication that
somehow we have to eliminate," he said. "We don't want to throw the
baby out with the bath water."

The proposed March launch, with a launch window extending from March
11 to April 6, was primarily a planning target, Readdy admitted, timed
for a hookup with the International Space Station and a daytime
takeoff to give NASA engineers a good look at the shuttle as it
hurtles toward space.

If safety concerns delayed the launch indefinitely, "then so be it,"
he said.

Columbia disintegrated above Texas as it glided toward landing in
Florida on Feb. 1, killing the seven astronauts on board.

DOOMED BY LOOSE INSULATION

The independent Columbia Accident Investigation Board appointed to
find the tragedy's cause said in a report released two weeks ago the
shuttle was doomed by loose insulation foam that struck its wing
shortly after takeoff and blamed a NASA culture that, in its haste to
get shuttles into space, ignored the problem despite warnings from its
own people.

The foam damaged the wing's heat shield which allowed the intense heat
of re-entry into earth's atmosphere to penetrate the shuttle and break
it apart more than 40 miles above northern Texas.

Internal e-mails released after the accident showed that lower level
NASA engineers warned of a possible catastrophe, but their superiors
either never saw the warnings or believed them to be overblown.

"Quite frankly, we missed something, we screwed up," Readdy said.

NASA said it would make changes in the shuttle to eliminate the loose
foam problem, including the use of heaters to replace the need for
insulation, and look for other potential sources of danger to
eliminate.

It said it also was testing materials and procedures for repairing
shuttle damage during flight and evaluating the concept of using the
space station as a refuge for stranded shuttle crews. The
investigation board criticized NASA for a lack of contingency plans
during flight emergencies

Also, under consideration is a plan to put cameras on the shuttle so
that its exterior can be examined for damage after it reaches orbit,
the agency said.

http://asia.reuters.com/newsArticle....toryID=3407124
 




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