|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#11
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
In article , Pat Flannery wrote:
Doug... wrote: I think the conclusions of the board also reflect the state in which the bodies were recovered. You could probably tell whether or not a crewman was completely suited based on the remains of the body and the suit. Trying to be as delicate as possible about this...some of the bodies were found very far from the crashed cockpit area, and in a badly burned and dismembered state...it is not unusual for passengers falling from an disintegrating airliner at cruising altitude to spin so quickly when they are falling toward the ground that both clothing and limbs are stripped from them be centrifugal force. FWIW, there's a reference in the report (can't remember where, pdf's on another machine) to the cause-of-death of the crew; it mentions that the knowledge that some weren't wearing gloves was arrived at by the teams working on the bodies, or at least that's how I read it... -- -Andrew Gray |
#12
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
Pat Flannery wrote in
: Frankly, if correctly reported, this is the single most disturbing thing I've heard to date regarding the loss of Columbia.... Surely that's a facetious statement. There were plenty of other things in the report that I found far more disturbing than the fact that the crew was slow in donning equipment that wouldn't have saved them anyway. To me though, that slow donning was emblematic of the whole situation that led to the loss of Columbia; Fine, you *and* Derek want to evade the question of whether you really consider this issue to be the "single most disturbing thing" you've heard about Columbia. I'll ask the question in a different way: Do you really consider the crew putting on their gloves late during entry to be more disturbing than: 1) the fact that NASA knew about the ET foam shedding problem since 1981, but never considered it important enough to ground the fleet to fix? 2) the fact that NASA never performed foam impact testing on the RCC before deciding to live with the foam shedding problem? 3) the fact that, due to the lack of foam impact testing, the Debris Assessment Team had to use a software tool to analyze a foam strike that was far outside the database to which the tool was validated? 4) the fact that the MER manager's presentation of the Debris Assessment Team's conclusions to the Mission Management Team systematically downplayed all the team's uncertainties regarding the validity of said conclusions? 5) the fact that the MMT was unaware that three separate teams were requesting imaging, and in cancelling one of them, inadvertently cancelled all three? 6) the manner and extent to which the crew was notified of the foam strike? a failure to go "by the book" at every phase of the whole operaton....when mission rules state that you should be fully suited up at X minutes before reentry, you should be suited up by that time- not around that time. I suppose you consider Schirra's failure to wear his helmet during Apollo 7's entry to be more disturbing than the Apollo 1 fire? -- JRF Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail, check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and think one step ahead of IBM. |
#14
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
On 28 Aug 2003 01:10:01 GMT, in a place far, far away, "Doug..."
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that: A lot of people have raised the question as to whether the Columbia disaster could have happened on Gene Kranz's or Chris Kraft's shift, and the general consensus is that Kranz and Kraft were no more superhuman than the current flight directors. I will bring up the possibility that, just perhaps, you would at least have seen imaging and more follow-up on the foam strike problem had Mad Don Arabian still been managing the MER. I don't necessarily want to join the crowd in scapegoating Linda Ham, but seriously, can you imagine Glynn Lunney or Gene Kranz in this scenario? "He deflected concerns about wing damage and failed to investigate the adequacy of the engineering analysis because -- as he told reporters -- he did not feel competent to do so." -- simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole) interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org "Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..." Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me. Here's my email address for autospammers: |
#15
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
|
#16
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
"Doug..." wrote in
: I can see the point of both earlier posters, that safety protocols had become so lax that fairly important things like donning your PGA and sealing it up on schedule was something that was never enforced or even fairly monitored. Of course it's important, but such incidents of laxness have been occurring at NASA since the 1960s, many of them have been discussed at length in sci.space.history, and *never* *once* did Pat Flannery express that he was "disturbed" by them. Examples include: - Wally Schirra not wearing his helmet during the Apollo 7 entry - Story Musgrave standing up throughout a shuttle entry - Dick Scobee not locking his harness during the 51L ascent But suddenly he thinks that the 107 crew being slow putting on their gloves is the "single most disturbing thing" he's heard about Columbia? Give me a ****ing break! None of the earlier incidents contributed to an accident, and neither did the 107 crew's. However, I also see your point, Jorge. The PGA issue was very reflective of culture problems, but so are all the points you raised. Thank you. I might add that if the PGA issue is reflective of a culture problem, it is a problem that has existed throughout NASA's history, per the examples above. It isn't something that gradually crept in over time. And the points you raised are far more serious in potential catastrophic results than whether or not you've got your helmet and gloves on on-time. Exactly. And we must consider that crews don't always disobey safety rules because they're lax about safety; sometimes they do so because they think the rule is wrong. The shuttle ACES suits are only rated up to 100 kft altitude, so they're not terribly useful early during entry. And the gloves and helmet cause reach-and-visibility constraints that could impede the crew in dealing with some types of contingencies. So some astronauts could legitimately feel safer delaying the helmet and gloves until they're a little closer to the suit's spec limit. That doesn't make it *right* - if you think the rule is wrong, don't just break it, propose a rule change - but it is understandable. Schirra's incident falls into this category as well. So, here's to finding another Mad Don Arabian to run the MER in the future... Agreed! -- JRF Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail, check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and think one step ahead of IBM. |
#17
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
|
#18
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
"Jorge R. Frank" wrote:
Fine, you *and* Derek want to evade the question of whether you really consider this issue to be the "single most disturbing thing" you've heard about Columbia. Pay attention Jorge, I never claimed it was any such thing. Those are Pat's words. D. -- The STS-107 Columbia Loss FAQ can be found at the following URLs: Text-Only Version: http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq.html Enhanced HTML Version: http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq_x.html Corrections, comments, and additions should be e-mailed to , as well as posted to sci.space.history and sci.space.shuttle for discussion. |
#19
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
h (Rand Simberg) wrote:
On 28 Aug 2003 01:10:01 GMT, in a place far, far away, "Doug..." made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that: A lot of people have raised the question as to whether the Columbia disaster could have happened on Gene Kranz's or Chris Kraft's shift, and the general consensus is that Kranz and Kraft were no more superhuman than the current flight directors. I will bring up the possibility that, just perhaps, you would at least have seen imaging and more follow-up on the foam strike problem had Mad Don Arabian still been managing the MER. I don't necessarily want to join the crowd in scapegoating Linda Ham, but seriously, can you imagine Glynn Lunney or Gene Kranz in this scenario? Easily, because they, like the rest of the Apollo era controllers, were only human, and not the demi-gods of recent popular perception. In recent discussions on .history and .shuttle several instances of them taking questionable actions have been shown. D. -- The STS-107 Columbia Loss FAQ can be found at the following URLs: Text-Only Version: http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq.html Enhanced HTML Version: http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq_x.html Corrections, comments, and additions should be e-mailed to , as well as posted to sci.space.history and sci.space.shuttle for discussion. |
#20
|
|||
|
|||
Columbia crew not fully suited up during reentry?
On 28 Aug 2003 03:55:01 GMT, in a place far, far away,
(Derek Lyons) made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that: I don't necessarily want to join the crowd in scapegoating Linda Ham, but seriously, can you imagine Glynn Lunney or Gene Kranz in this scenario? Easily, because they, like the rest of the Apollo era controllers, were only human, and not the demi-gods of recent popular perception. In recent discussions on .history and .shuttle several instances of them taking questionable actions have been shown. The issue isn't taking questionable actions. The issue is saying, well, what she said. Even if they weren't competent to assess the analysis, I can't imagine them admitting it... ;-) -- simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole) interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org "Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..." Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me. Here's my email address for autospammers: |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|