Riding the Booster in HD - To Space and back in 400 secs

Found this awesome footage and I think it has not been posted on ATS yet, at least I couldn't find it.

Enjoy




ETA: Please watch in fullscreen and HD with surround sound for the maximum awesome-factor.

Awesome!!

Thanks for posting

I have never seen anything like at 5:06, what is that thing coming from earth? Anyone know? Looks like lightning lol.

reply to post by H1ght3chHippie


Wow what a ride! S&F, you made my day and its only 12:30 !

reply to post by H1ght3chHippie


That's awesome footage! I love the sounds after the boosters separate and slowly spin. It's very haunting. Good find!
S&F!

That was truly cool.

I especially like how it shows the shuttle breaking the sound barrier at approx. 700 mph.
You see the vapor barrier almost, cloud-like, build up then fly past, that's when it happens.
But when those boosters start spinning back...pheew! I thought I was going to puke!


Very cool find and interesting footage.
I like the sounds too.

Glad you guys like it.

Nothing like a lil' afternoon trip to orbit when you come home from work hehe.

Originally posted by Thebel
I have never seen anything like at 5:06, what is that thing coming from earth? Anyone know? Looks like lightning lol.

thats the pillars of smoke from the ascent of the boosters themself i reckon.you can also see Florida,and i think the boosters landed in the Gulf somewhere.

If its taking off from Cape Canaveral, the boosters (SRBs) land in the Atlantic ocean approximately 122 nautical miles (141 statute miles) downrange.

reply to post by H1ght3chHippie

Is it just me or...did anyone else notice 2 or 3 pieces of something (heat tiles?) fall off some piece of the nose or front of the shuttle in the first few seconds? It seems quite visible and it reminded me of the saddest moment in space exploration history.

I was quite surprised to see it wasn't going faster but maybe the shuttle's speed increases again after the boosters are detached. Great film footage in any case.

reply to post by LightSpeedDriver


Its ice, if you mean right after liftoff. Notice how the entire pad looks frosted over from the LOX. Also notice around 5:10 as a booster hits the atmosphere at all of the ice that built up after they ran out of fuel broke free, in fact the atmosphere even ignited momentarily some unused fuel for a second around that point.

It looks like tiles and could very well be, as it also looks like a lot of tiles are already missing, or the replacement tiles just aren't the same color. The black tiles on the Shuttle have additional carbon for greater heat protection, it is possible that through the 30 years of developments that NASA created a better tile with a different elemental composite, and became unnecessary to be blackened with carbon. Something I haven't looked into.

The tiles are really cool, one can hold one in his bare hands while the tile still has an internal heat of about 2,400ºF. An amazing composite.

reply to post by Illustronic


Funny thing is .. the Russians used - or are using - cork as heat shields, and it works great.

And guess what .. it's cheap lol

You can even try that at home .. get a gas burner and burn a cork surface with it. It will turn black immediately but only on the surface in a very thin layer.