John Young's shuttle secret

Was doing a little research into how John Young manually handled the
increased sideslip, that the GPC software could not handle in STS-1. What
do these guys eat for breakfast??? ;-)

Anyway, in my google searches I came up story about John Young and STS-1
that mentioned that the right landing gear was buckled (to some extent I
guess), due to hot gas that had entered the wheel well.

I searched the group via google to see if anybody had mentioned this in the
past and didn't find any matches, so I apologize if this is a repeat.
Thought others, might be interested in this as well....

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/15/1

and then the same article can be found on John's website....
http://www.johnwyoung.com/main/secret.htm

Anybody else heard any more about this. Looks like the story is about eight
months old.

jg

"jg" wrote in message
...
| Was doing a little research into how John Young manually handled the
| increased sideslip, that the GPC software could not handle in STS-1. What
| do these guys eat for breakfast??? ;-)
|
| Anyway, in my google searches I came up story about John Young and STS-1
| that mentioned that the right landing gear was buckled (to some extent I
| guess), due to hot gas that had entered the wheel well.
|
| I searched the group via google to see if anybody had mentioned this in
the
| past and didn't find any matches, so I apologize if this is a repeat.
| Thought others, might be interested in this as well....
|
| http://www.thespacereview.com/article/15/1
|
| and then the same article can be found on John's website....
| http://www.johnwyoung.com/main/secret.htm
|
| Anybody else heard any more about this. Looks like the story is about
eight
| months old.
|
| jg
|
|
Hmm, well I seem to recall the problems with the tiles while in orbit, and
did hear at the time that problems were encountered on reentry. I've not
read the story, but are you saying it was kept secret? Surely those who
realised the implications knew there were some problems. It was after all, a
first flight, and that is always going to have its surprises.

To me, the landing looked like it might have flipped the orbiter after main
gear touchdown, as the nose started to go up alarmingly fast to my sort of
just about working eyes in those days.

Brian

--
Brian Gaff....
graphics are great, but the blind can't hear them
Email:
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"Brian Gaff" wrote:
"jg" wrote:

| Was doing a little research into how John Young manually handled the
| increased sideslip, that the GPC software could not handle in STS-1.
What
| do these guys eat for breakfast??? ;-)
|
| Anyway, in my google searches I came up story about John Young and STS-1
| that mentioned that the right landing gear was buckled (to some extent I
| guess), due to hot gas that had entered the wheel well.

Av Week had an excellent article on STS 1 post landing as did National
Geographic IIRC. I don't remember that being brought up as an issue but
the aft fuselage did get singed/toasted due to the elevon gap, IIRC.

STS 2 review here.

http://groups.google.com/groups?q=ST...d70.172&rnum=1

| I searched the group via google to see if anybody had mentioned this in
the
| past and didn't find any matches, so I apologize if this is a repeat.
| Thought others, might be interested in this as well....

| http://www.thespacereview.com/article/15/1
|
| and then the same article can be found on John's website....
| http://www.johnwyoung.com/main/secret.htm


Very good. Thanks.

| Anybody else heard any more about this. Looks like the story is about
eight
| months old.

I'll check my archives tonight.

Hmm, well I seem to recall the problems with the tiles while in orbit, and
did hear at the time that problems were encountered on reentry. I've not
read the story, but are you saying it was kept secret? Surely those who
realised the implications knew there were some problems. It was after all,
a
first flight, and that is always going to have its surprises.

Yes we have discussed that here a few times.

To me, the landing looked like it might have flipped the orbiter after
main
gear touchdown, as the nose started to go up alarmingly fast to my sort of
just about working eyes in those days.

STS 3 had the great wheelie and slam. GTG.

--

Daniel
http://www.challengerdisaster.info
Mount Charleston, not Charleston, SC

In article s_BIb.97236$pY.55846@fed1read04, Charleston wrote:
|
| and then the same article can be found on John's website....
| http://www.johnwyoung.com/main/secret.htm

Interesting article (and I know Mr. Maxson didn't write the attribution
above), but I should point out that it may not actually be operated by Mr.
Young -- there is a disclaimer on the main page, as well as another link on
it that refers to him in the third person. Seems like a fan site.

Caveat emptor, and all that jazz.

To me, the landing looked like it might have flipped the orbiter after
main
gear touchdown, as the nose started to go up alarmingly fast to my sort of
just about working eyes in those days.

STS 3 had the great wheelie and slam. GTG.

There's been other close calls in the program during final approach and
touchdown such as the time when a procedural failure (from a supporting
team member for the MCC front-room folks for obtaining and passing along
the current wind data at the landing site) nearly resulted in a smoking
crater for ... hrm, can't remember which one mission that one was.

The "PF" (pilot flying) -- the CDR? -- politely charmed way out of it at
the post landing press conference when it was raised by saying something
along the lines of "Golly, I must've missed that!" but was reportedly to
have privately blown an *huge* fuse (for understandable reasons) over the
incident as he had just *barely* put it down on the beginning of the
runway.

The incident resulted in a very firm and immediate procedural rule change
where MCC was required to call a certain person at the landing site to
obtain the latest site weather data and to pass it along to the flight
crew. That was definitely a mighty close call!

The crew member who flew that landing was either Scott or Steve... a name
starting with S, as I seem to recall.

There's been a couple other close calls as well. Landing accidents
generally thought to be the most likely way to lose another orbiter; the
calculated odds seems to support that line of reasoning -- ascent odds
improved significantly, but landing odds are relatively static.

-Dan

Dan Foster wrote in
:

There's been other close calls in the program during final approach
and touchdown such as the time when a procedural failure (from a
supporting team member for the MCC front-room folks for obtaining and
passing along the current wind data at the landing site) nearly
resulted in a smoking crater for ... hrm, can't remember which one
mission that one was.

STS-37.

The "PF" (pilot flying) -- the CDR?

Yes.

The crew member who flew that landing was either Scott or Steve... a
name starting with S, as I seem to recall.

Steve Nagel.

--
JRF

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check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.

On Wed, 31 Dec 2003 01:57:57 -0600, "jg" wrote:

Was doing a little research into how John Young manually handled the
increased sideslip, that the GPC software could not handle in STS-1. What
do these guys eat for breakfast??? ;-)

John didn't do anything. It was the guys on the subsequent flights
who did.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer

Thanks for the response Mary.

I'm a little confused, because I read a lot of stuff last night so maybe my
mind was swimming a bit.

Didn't John Young have to manually, or at least assist the orbiter (at some
point) after or during the first S-turn during STS-1's decent??

Part of one of your quotes from the thread "Question RE landings" said...

After the first S-turn on STS-1, the entire re-entry was hand-flown
through STS-4, at which point the FCS was rewritten (and the e-seats
removed). John Young took over the flying when the sideslip meter
pegged and stayed pegged for several seconds, meaning that the limit
had been exceeded.

Are you saying that John only took over briefly? I was under the impression
that he brought the shuttle down to landing after the first S-turn. Or did
I completely miss what he was actually doing?

Thanks for all your input into the group. I really appreciated it.

jg

Part of what I was reading was from the "Manual re-entry?" thread from back
in Nov of 2002.
"Mary Shafer" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 31 Dec 2003 01:57:57 -0600, "jg" wrote:

Was doing a little research into how John Young manually handled the
increased sideslip, that the GPC software could not handle in STS-1.
What
do these guys eat for breakfast??? ;-)

John didn't do anything. It was the guys on the subsequent flights
who did.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer