The Real Soyuz Problem - Looking Past the Smoke and Flames by Jim O

"Craig Fink" wrote in message
...
Space Balls wrote:

Great read!

Yeah, I agree.

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/content/?cid=5412

Yikes! I want the ISS partnership to work, but jeez folks...why not
let
the
rocket scientists figure out what's wrong with the capsule?! This is
getting to be ridiculous.

snip

I think this discussion misses a central point. The
Russians experienced a moderately serious technical
problem with one of their space ships. *Any engineer
can tell you, those things happen* if you do
anything. Of course, us Americans don't see any such
accidents with *our* hardware in space -- we have
only some 50-year-old stuff we use as little as
possible. As vs the Russians who are well into their
*second thousand* of launches.

Titeotwawki -- mha [sci.space.policy]

On May 1, 11:08 am, "Martha Adams" wrote:
"Craig Fink" wrote in message

...

Space Balls wrote:

Great read!

Yeah, I agree.

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/content/?cid=5412

Yikes! I want the ISS partnership to work, but jeez folks...why not
let
the
rocket scientists figure out what's wrong with the capsule?! This is
getting to be ridiculous.

snip

I think this discussion misses a central point. The
Russians experienced a moderately serious technical
problem with one of their space ships. *Any engineer
can tell you, those things happen* if you do
anything. Of course, us Americans don't see any such
accidents with *our* hardware in space -- we have
only some 50-year-old stuff we use as little as
possible. As vs the Russians who are well into their
*second thousand* of launches.

Apparently Russian designed capsules have very good failsafe modes.

The astronauts survived, right? Twice, right? Or was it three times?

If this had been Orion they would have been digging their charred
bodies out of a smoking hole in the ground somewhere in Texas.

And they would have done nothing, and then launched again.

"Martha Adams" wrote:

I think this discussion misses a central point. The
Russians experienced a moderately serious technical
problem with one of their space ships.

Not "a" event, but rather _three_ events... With the third seeming to
be a repeat of the second.

Of course, us Americans don't see any such
accidents with *our* hardware in space -- we have
only some 50-year-old stuff we use as little as
possible.

Please point out what 50 year old hardware the US is using, and while
you are looking up dates - check the design dates of the Soyuz
booster.

As vs the Russians who are well into their *second
thousand* of launches.

An intelligent observer might note that despite the impressiveness of
the raw numbers, the actual success rate is virtually
indistinguishable from that of boosters flown much less often.

A less intelligent observer is too overawed by the raw numbers to
think shallowly. Let alone deeply.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

On Thu, 01 May 2008 16:17:12 GMT, in a place far, far away,
(Derek Lyons) made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

"Martha Adams" wrote:

I think this discussion misses a central point. The
Russians experienced a moderately serious technical
problem with one of their space ships.

Not "a" event, but rather _three_ events... With the third seeming to
be a repeat of the second.

And two in a row.

There is much discussion on distrust that the russians will seriously
investigate this issue and work to find a resolution.

Is there any possibility that the real problem is one of communicatiosn
between the russian universe and the NASA/western universe where we just
aren't told what the russians are doing and thus assume they are doing
nothing and trying to hide the problem under the carpet ?

Post Columbia, NASA said the foam problem had been fixed. But it took a
number of post-columbia flights before NASA finally narrowed down the
problem and the last flight was the first one without foam issues.

One big thing NASA did was to add cameras everywhere and recorded as
much as possible to try to find out exactly what happened.

Look at the ECO sensors. That also took a number of flights before NASA
concluded it was a design issue and not just a one-off anomaly, at whcih
point, it decided to really study the problem and found out a connector
was at fault.

Considering that there is far less cameras/instrumentatiion on he Soyuz,
no arm to peek at its back and that the problem happens shortly before
re-entry, there isn't much time for them to investigate exactly what
goes wrong.

Consider also the possibility that while there may have been multiple
ballistic re-entries, what if they were all caused by different
underlying problems and that after each such problem, they did fix the
underlying problem (but another one propped up). One case might have
been a computer glitch. Another case might have been faulty wiring, and
this last case, might be the SM refusing to divorce the re-entry capsule.

As armchair critics, it is easy for us to view the russians as trying to
hide the problems and trivialise their impact. But is that really a
fair accusation considering that we are not there, we don't speak
russian and rely on translated tidbits instead of the full story ?

Russia underestimates the western thirst for technical information about
its space programme and it should provide far more information in english.

Space Balls wrote:
Great read!

defineltly! it's jim objerg's article - always good for a laugh or two. plus you
can train yourslef in spotting his usual self-contradictions.

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/content/?cid=5412


"...of the incident investigation that is just now starting."

ok, got it, the investigation is just starting.

"...NASA engineers in Houston whispered of a barely-avoided 'thermal breach'
that would have killed the crew, but for the wind-induced stresses that tore the
two units apart and allowed the crew cabin to right itself."

what? if the "investihation is just now starting" (and it's not even in the
usa), how on earth did these nasa engineers get such a precise information about
what hapened?

John Doe wrote:

As armchair critics, it is easy for us to view the russians as trying to
hide the problems and trivialise their impact. But is that really a
fair accusation considering that we are not there, we don't speak
russian and rely on translated tidbits instead of the full story ?

Given the history (including recent history) of Russia hiding problems
and trivializing their impact... Yeah, it's fair accusation.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

Korben Dallas wrote:

Space Balls wrote:
Great read!

defineltly! it's jim objerg's article - always good for a laugh or two. plus you
can train yourslef in spotting his usual self-contradictions.

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/content/?cid=5412


"...of the incident investigation that is just now starting."

ok, got it, the investigation is just starting.

"...NASA engineers in Houston whispered of a barely-avoided 'thermal breach'
that would have killed the crew, but for the wind-induced stresses that tore the
two units apart and allowed the crew cabin to right itself."

what? if the "investihation is just now starting" (and it's not even in the
usa), how on earth did these nasa engineers get such a precise information about
what hapened?

Because we already know _what_ happened, but we don't know _how_ it
happened.

But the distinction between such vastly different words as 'what' and
'how' is probably too subtle for you.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL