|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#1
|
|||
|
|||
ATV may be delayed again
full article at
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles...-esas-atv.html The European Space Agency's first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) will begin its programme's four-month long qualification process in April, which will help to answer NASA's questions about International Space Station (ISS) safety and the potential for commercial ATV cargo supply. NASA has some tough questions and it is felt the July 25 launch date will have to be delayed. Has Kurs gone through similar USA study/approval before ? Reading the article, I get the impression that because NASA's DART experiment failed, they feel the europeans would also fail. Does NASA have a nagative attitude towards ESA's capabilities ? Or has the ATV project been plagued by so many problems that NASA is right to wonder if the project was managed with "total quality assurance" from head to toe ? |
#2
|
|||
|
|||
ATV may be delayed again
The European Space Agency's first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV)
will begin its programme's four-month long qualification process in April, which will help to answer NASA's questions about International Space Station (ISS) safety and the potential for commercial ATV cargo supply. Well, I'm not sure exactly where this is coming from, but it seems that Congress set up a committee in 2005: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=23486 That such committees recommend more reviews and tests is a pretty much universal tendency. There doesn't seem to be a lot of reason to suspect they are picking on ATV in particular (at least, not based on a quick glance). There's also some information at: https://onemis.nasa.gov/iss_safety/ including biographies of the participants (short summary: mostly career NASA people). |
#3
|
|||
|
|||
ATV may be delayed again
"John Doe" a écrit dans le message de news: ... full article at http://www.flightglobal.com/articles...-esas-atv.html The European Space Agency's first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) will begin its programme's four-month long qualification process in April, which will help Acually, ATV qualification has been on-going from quite some time now. It was already underway last summer. to answer NASA's questions about International Space Station (ISS) safety and Also a process which has been ongoing for more than a year. the potential for commercial ATV cargo supply. NASA has some tough questions and it is felt the July 25 launch date will have to be delayed. July launch has been known to be overly optimistic for quite some time. Try October or November, IMO.... if all goes well. Has Kurs gone through similar USA study/approval before ? Kurs was completely redesigned by the russians for the ATV. The electronics are completely different. OTOH, NASA asked also some very difficult questions ( as in, it's difficult to get the answer from the russians ) about completely recurent componants, which have flown for decades ( like ADA ). Sometime, it feels like NASA is using ATV to get knowledge on Progress and Soyouz ( or to discover what NASA should have done with these in contingency cases ). |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
ATV may be delayed again
frédéric haessig wrote:
July launch has been known to be overly optimistic for quite some time. Try October or November, IMO.... if all goes well. Merci. Do you know if there are known problems/issues with it ? Or is it just a question of pleasing paperwork people , especially at NASA ? which have flown for decades ( like ADA ). Sometime, it feels like NASA is using ATV to get knowledge on Progress and Soyouz ( or to discover what NASA should have done with these in contingency cases ). One of the articles I had read mentioned that the USA committes became more weary after the NASA projects such as DART had failed. I guess there is some logic to this. If NASA's quality assurance and testing failed to prevent the DART failure, then those same standards and quality assurance process would also not prevent failure of ATV. |
#5
|
|||
|
|||
ATV may be delayed again
"John Doe" a écrit dans le message de news: ... frédéric haessig wrote: July launch has been known to be overly optimistic for quite some time. Try October or November, IMO.... if all goes well. Merci. Do you know if there are known problems/issues with it ? Or is it just a question of pleasing paperwork people , especially at NASA ? A bit of both. The qualification has revealed a few unforeseen problems ( that's what testing is for, after all ) but all the ones I'm aware of ( which means all on the docking - and refueling - system plus a bit on the rest of the system ) required only changes in procedures or aditionnal analysis to confirm that actual design margins were enough. There were talk to go farther than that on a few points at the beginning of the year ( ie limited SW changes ) but it has not proven necessary AFAIK. Of course, there's always new requests on points which were not in the original specifications and/or trying to sneak in new requirements ( aka mission creep ) even as late as now ( and on a fixed cost contract )...... which have flown for decades ( like ADA ). Sometime, it feels like NASA is using ATV to get knowledge on Progress and Soyouz ( or to discover what NASA should have done with these in contingency cases ). One of the articles I had read mentioned that the USA committes became more weary after the NASA projects such as DART had failed. I guess there is some logic to this. If NASA's quality assurance and testing failed to prevent the DART failure, then those same standards and quality assurance process would also not prevent failure of ATV. Actually, I have seen this from three-four years ago, even before the DART failure. Not to mention that ATV quality assurance is under ESA standard, not NASA and that ESA and the russian space agancy have much more input on ATV testing than NASA. |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Ares I already delayed? | apozo | Policy | 3 | October 11th 06 04:34 AM |
Falcon delayed again | Pat Flannery | Policy | 2 | November 17th 05 03:08 PM |
Falcon delayed again | Pat Flannery | History | 2 | November 17th 05 03:08 PM |
JIMO Delayed ? | Iain Young | Policy | 1 | February 2nd 05 03:44 AM |
X-43A flight delayed. | Jacques van Oene | Space Shuttle | 36 | May 14th 04 12:29 AM |