Columbia

thats true but the styrofoam hit during the liftoff, there is be no way in hell they woulda launched columbia had a hole in her wing prior to launch

The styrofoam impact occured during lift off - not prior - and not at a stage lift off could have been aborted. For a clue about the density of the styrofoam used - look at you hot water tank (I know older ones have jackets - but newer ones are a good scale model). The foam is 2-3" thick - and is extremely dense - if you fashioned a rod of it and hit some one it would do some damage. Now scale that up many many times - to cope with the extremes of space flight - and throw a chunk of it at a leading wing edge - it would do a lot of harm.

The fault or conspiracy is why something that is evident on the launch footage as happening was ignored - and worse not even investigated during one of the EVAs.

Just to add to spookygirls post -

Dont think in terms of the styrofoam you might find packing a TV or filling some holes in a wall. This stuff is the product of years of research - some stuff I have come into contact with over the years will actually act as bullet proofing for the interior panels of cars modified for police work - its actually that dense. Whilst not as effective as Kevlar/Carbon Fibre composites its damn near bullet and bomb proof - plus the fact its incredibly light.

What I see as the main problem here is the change that came over Nasa when the Apollo series stopped.

We came up with a workable machine except we took out the best part that we learned during that time. An escape system that would offer those riding a chance to escape death when confronted.

Senario follows:

we hear the speaker counting down 3,2,1 ignition and liftoff, but then there is a OH MY GOD a mere ten feet off the pad an explosion has occured.
I work in an IT dept and there is a saying " fail to plan - you plan on failing" with Nasa not looking to protect the crew at this point why would they seek to spend money they clearly feel is not needed. This mind set has been there since I wrote them back in 1980 of watching a Shuttle explode during launch, Challenger was that vision. I had made a model built from Revell and Monogram into one that had the crew section turned into an escape system, where parachutes would deploy as in Apollo and bring our people home safely, Nasa wrote me back Saying thanks for your concern but the Shuttle would land at an emergency runway. They didn't see a disaster that would distroy the entire craft, they failed to plan.

Michael

[Edited on 13-10-2003 by Ark-Angel]

I missed the message about a plasma bolt hitting the Shuttle. Is that a statement perhaps some type of UFO could have taken a shot at the Shuttle as it was de-orbiting? Hostile et's, anyone who has had an abduction will clearly agree to having poor manors or another agenda.

Sometime the best answer is the first one that pop's up, just an accident from foam that's harder than normal foam most people think about which punched a hole in the leading edge.....

Michael

It was a piece of foam insualtion from the external tank that made a gap in the wing that let super hot gasses in durring reentry and all hell broke lose. The observer in Cali said he could see a debris trial that appeared to be coming off the left wing. The astronaughts died because of blunt trauma and oxygen aphyxiation. Had the breach in the wing been noticed, it would have been possible to send up space shuttle Atlantis for a rescue mission. People on the ground knew it was at risk but were afraid that if they were wrong they would be repremanded. The mission until the re-entry went flawless, that should have given the people in charge the clue that something was wrong. I am not sure if we will ever see another shuttle launch.

Conspiracy theories abound, but bear in mind that hypersonic speeds do freaky things to aerodynamics. I won't go into detail here, but one of things that does occur is chemical change - basically your plasma streams. At very high temperatures, you even get atomic oxygen and nitrogen whizzing around, which is bad for anybody's health. Plasma streams can bore right through metals, plus you have the problem of the shuttle's internal metallic structure coming into contact with highly energised plasma. In this case, I believe that plasma arcing was a distinct possibility.

As for the shuttle foam impact, yes, it's very hard stuff (and cold; therefore brittle) and a big enough chunk would gouge tiles out quite easily. In fact, this is a regular occurance in shuttle missions but this one was really bad. Explosion of the tires and hydraulic systems for the elevator/aileron actuators would have blown the already weakened wing clear and the resulting reaction, C of G change and compression would have kicked Columbia over into an uncrecoverable roll which then degenerated into a 3-axis spin, something like a piece of paper fluttering in the breeze.

Had the shuttle been designed with a jetissonable nose section, a balute drag system (for re-entry) and recovery parachutes, the crews of both Columbia and Challenger would have been able to survive. As it is, we've lost 14 astronauts to bureaucracy.

Strange I've only been trying since 1980 to get Nasa to implement such a design after having a trip into the future with Christ showing me the Challenger disaster,
my website, and letter I recently sent to Bush,

home.earthlink.net...

Michael

what struck me reading the articel was that digital images :
The pictures, taken with a Nikon-880 digital camera on a tripod.

have to be developped :
"I couldn't see the discharge with own eyes, but it showed up clear and bright on the film when I developed it," the photographer said

Never heard of this, so what yall think about this maybe theres something wrong with this photographer....and his pictures.

I guess to NASA and the US government the cost of providing the shuttle astronauts with a good escape system like the one mention above is more than the 14 human lives.
The space shuttle is the best space vehicle ever, take offs and re-entries are dangerous; accidents will happen. With a little modification the shuttle could have a great escape system and they could keep on flying for many years. Maybe they should design another fleet of space shuttles with an escape system and retire the existing ones. If we want to continue improving the ISS and continue doing science experiments in space we need the space shuttle. The technology we get from micro-gravity experiments is worth the cost of a good space program
After Columbia's failure it seems like the government is quietly trying to cancel our manned space program. The space plane that was suppose to be a rescue ship for the ISS as been nixxed by legislation. I would not be suprise of the shuttle program is next.
Come on China, give our country the will to continue space exploration.

I echo your sentiment, O tubular dude.

The modifications I suggested could only have been built into the shuttle, mind - and added about three tonnes of mass to the total weight. The balutes are untested technology (a distant cousin was used to bring Pathfinder to a bounce-down) and the escape system would have added about two years of testing to the shuttle program.

By contrast, it would have been impossible to implement such a technology on a capsule or a mini-shuttle. Just too darn small. What we have in the space shuttle is neither fish nor fowl, able to do all things but none of them expertly.

Now, having said that, if we look at both accidents, they were caused directly or indirectly by the launch system, a faulty O-ring for Challenger's SRBs and a big chunk of foam that hit the wrong place for Columbia. NASA's other shuttle proposals included winged, fly-back first stages - and of course, a reduced payload capacity because of decreased efficiency.

A marvel of 1970s technology, the shuttle has served us well despite its failures. It has been our first true spaceship. But the time has come to put them in the museums where they belong. Perhaps the likes of Burt Rutan with his X-Prize entry will be the wave of future.

Scaled Composites

Haha, I was born in 1980! Some of my first memories are of looking at National Geographics with articles on the shuttle. I remember the first pictures of Columbia coming out on its crawler, shots from its first mission in orbit.

What a waste.

It had too many strange things about it ... all those 16's... the first isreali astronaut.. breaking up over palestine texas... funny but wasn't jessica lynch from there?

I live near the space center and my dad works for them. It is ironic that they had spent and had the most security ever for the final flight of Columbia becaue there was a lot of Isrealis here to watch their man get blasted into orbit. They spent a lot time and money planning for an almost non-existant terror threat while they overlooked the fatal blow to the wing. NASA failed not the shuttle.
The headlines in the Iraqi newpaper(pre US invasion) after it happened read "Allah strikes down US shuttle" those a-holes deserved to get there arse whipped for that comment.

Ah well, what can you expect. It didn't save stop the good old US of A blitzkrieging its way into Iraq now, did it?