Historic Cape Launch Tower Demolished (With Video Clip)

Here's a short video I took of the SLC-40 launch tower demolition:

http://www.spaceflightvideos.com/spe...ort_042708.wmv
(copy/paste to your browser if the link displays on two lines)

CAPE CANAVERAL AFS, FL - It took just 200 pounds of high explosives to
topple 6,500 tons of space history this morning at Cape Canaveral as
the Air Force demolished the abandoned mobile launch tower at Space
Launch Complex-40. Today's controlled demolition sets the stage for a
dramatic reconstruction of the launch site in support of a new rocket,
SpaceX's Falcon 9, which will rise from a reborn SLC-40 early next
year.

Specially formed explosive charges were placed at strategic support
locations on the 1st and 9th levels of the mobile service tower to
break it into three sections upon detonation. The explosions were
timed to cause the twoer to fall down and then topple toward the
north, away from the concrete launch pad and construction work
currently underway by SpaceX.

The explosions alone didn't cause the tower to fall. Rather, they
destroyed key support locations within the MST and then the force of
gravity caused the 265 foot tall gantry to collapse.

45th Space Wing commanding officer, Brig. General Susan Helms, herself
a former space shuttle and station astronaut, called out the final ten
seconds before the charges were detonated on schedule at 9 a.m. EDT,
sending an Earth-shaking thunderclap rolling across the Canaveral
landscape.

Read the full story with photos and video clips he
http://www.spacearium.com/article.ph...80428192140573

"spacearium" wrote in message
...
Here's a short video I took of the SLC-40 launch tower demolition:


http://www.spaceflightvideos.com/spe...ort_042708.wmv
(copy/paste to your browser if the link displays on two lines)

CAPE CANAVERAL AFS, FL - It took just 200 pounds of high explosives to
topple 6,500 tons of space history this morning at Cape Canaveral as
the Air Force demolished the abandoned mobile launch tower at Space
Launch Complex-40. Today's controlled demolition sets the stage for a
dramatic reconstruction of the launch site in support of a new rocket,
SpaceX's Falcon 9, which will rise from a reborn SLC-40 early next
year.

Funny thing about that demolition... While it was spectacular, would it have
been easier and faster to dismantle the structure by having a tower crane
(like the one's used to build city buildings) assembled next to the
structure? Now, the workers have to be careful of loosened steel and other
items, whereas if the structure were dismantled, it may have been quicker,
easier and much safer.

Alan Erskine wrote:
Funny thing about that demolition... While it was spectacular, would
it have been easier and faster to dismantle the structure by having
a tower crane (like the one's used to build city buildings)
assembled next to the structure? Now, the workers have to be
careful of loosened steel and other items, whereas if the structure
were dismantled, it may have been quicker, easier and much safer.

When you detonate/implode you can then come-in with large machines to
more or less bite apart the steel etc into smaller peices.

Deconstruction requires more people, operating with torches (not the
flashlight kind for longer lengths of time. It generally takes
longer and has greater risk of injuries.

At least that is my impression after watching all those US cable TV
shows about demolition

rick jones
--
portable adj, code that compiles under more than one compiler
these opinions are mine, all mine; HP might not want them anyway...
feel free to post, OR email to rick.jones2 in hp.com but NOT BOTH...

On Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:10:49 -0700 (PDT), spacearium
wrote:

The explosions alone didn't cause the tower to fall. Rather, they
destroyed key support locations within the MST and then the force of
gravity caused the 265 foot tall gantry to collapse.

I never realized that things tend to fall in part due to gravity...

Dale

On Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:10:49 -0700 (PDT), spacearium
wrote:

45th Space Wing commanding officer, Brig. General Susan Helms, herself
a former space shuttle and station astronaut, called out the final ten
seconds before the charges were detonated on schedule at 9 a.m. EDT,
sending an Earth-shaking thunderclap rolling across the Canaveral
landscape.

Good grief. I met Susan when she was a USAF Test Pilot School
student, down at the far end of the flight line from Dryden. I got
her a flight in an F-104, going along in a chase plane for the HARV. I
was just wondering what she was doing these days.

Mary "Captains grow up and become BGens in no time"
--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
We didn't just do weird stuff at Dryden, we wrote reports about it.
or
Visit my blog at http://thedigitalknitter.blogspot.com/

On May 2, 7:26*pm, "Reunite Gondwanaland (Mary Shafer)"
wrote:
On Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:10:49 -0700 (PDT), spacearium

wrote:
45th Space Wing commanding officer, Brig. General Susan Helms, herself
a former space shuttle and station astronaut, called out the final ten
seconds before the charges were detonated on schedule at 9 a.m. EDT,
sending an Earth-shaking thunderclap rolling across the Canaveral
landscape.

Good grief. *I met Susan when she was a USAF Test Pilot School
student, down at the far end of the flight line from Dryden. *I got
her a flight in an F-104, going along in a chase plane for the HARV. I
was just wondering what she was doing these days.

Mary "Captains grow up and become BGens in no time"
--
Mary Shafer * Retired aerospace research engineer
We didn't just do weird stuff at Dryden, we wrote reports about it.
or
Visit my blog athttp://thedigitalknitter.blogspot.com/* *

I met then-Colonel Helms once or twice when she was at Air Force Space
Command. I did my best to do a quick pitch that AFSPC should be
looking more seriously at developments occurring in the world of
microspacecraft, but I wasn't invited to take it any further. I was
a little before my time for the current interest in ORS. She's one
heck of an accomplished lady and officer.

F-104s.... always loved them. Not the most operationally useful of
the Century Series fighters, but by far the coolest. Did you ever get
a ride?

Regards,
Matt Bille
Sci/Tech news blog:
http://mattbille.blogspot.com/

"Matt" wrote in message
...
F-104s.... always loved them. Not the most operationally useful of
the Century Series fighters, but by far the coolest. Did you ever get
a ride?

I would have thought it was one of the _hottest_ of the Century Series; I've
heard it was quite a handful. You might like to reminisce (spelling?) at
alt.binaries.pictures.aviation - great group, lots of pix.

Alan Erskine wrote:

I would have thought it was one of the _hottest_ of the Century Series;

Had a serious flaw for a dogfighter... if you threw it into too abrupt
of a climb it would end up going belly-first through the air and break
up (probably due to the high horizontal tail going into deep stall).
High G turns could also make it go out of control.
That might have accounted for a lot of the 292 Starfighter losses the
Luftwaffe suffered when using it as a low altitude attack aircraft, when
the pilots pulled out of their bombing run too abruptly.

Pat

On Sat, 3 May 2008 07:52:23 -0700 (PDT), Matt
wrote:

F-104s.... always loved them. Not the most operationally useful of
the Century Series fighters, but by far the coolest. Did you ever get
a ride?

Sure did. In 1983, in a TF-104G. N824NA, to be precise.

Mary "And it was fun!"
--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
We didn't just do weird stuff at Dryden, we wrote reports about it.
or
Visit my blog at http://thedigitalknitter.blogspot.com/

On Sat, 03 May 2008 16:12:49 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:

Alan Erskine wrote:

I would have thought it was one of the _hottest_ of the Century Series;

Had a serious flaw for a dogfighter... if you threw it into too abrupt
of a climb it would end up going belly-first through the air and break
up (probably due to the high horizontal tail going into deep stall).
High G turns could also make it go out of control.
That might have accounted for a lot of the 292 Starfighter losses the
Luftwaffe suffered when using it as a low altitude attack aircraft, when
the pilots pulled out of their bombing run too abruptly.

It was built to be a Mach-2 interceptor, not a Northern European
fighter or strike aircraft. It was definitely not a knife fighter.

Don't get me wrong; I love the Zipper. But, as I said many times
before, aircraft can't be all things (except the F-4 Phantom, but
that's more the result of P_sub_s). The F-104 had exceedingly high
wing loading and that limited its capabilities.

Mary "Looks so good"
--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
We didn't just do weird stuff at Dryden, we wrote reports about it.
or
Visit my blog at http://thedigitalknitter.blogspot.com/