Sigh. Just Sigh.
After the Columbia self-destructed during reentry, NASA stopped launching shuttles for long enough to do an investigation and suggest a few patches for keeping the next shuttle from becoming yet another spectacular catastrophe. They finally finished the investigation, set a launch date, and, after one delay having to do with the fuel gauges on the external tank, launched the shuttle Discovery into orbit on Tuesday.
Today, after looking at the films they took of the takeoff, NASA grounded the entire shuttle fleet again, because, um, large chunks of foam were falling off the external tank and whizzing by the solid-as-spit fire-resistant tiles on the wings of the shuttle.
Ooops.
And AAARRRGGGGHHHH!
Comments
I'd like to think it's not the biggest lemon ever built (the joint US/Soviet obsession of Really! Big! nuclear power plants sort of takes the cake there), but I've got a soft spot for space travel. The whole business of building insulating tiles out of spun snot does tend to drive me to your viewpoint; particularly since the ex-USSR has approximately 1000 energia boosters lying around and can, even with the country becoming part of the third world, can still push up unmanned cargo capsules almost any day of the week with a regularity that the space shuttle can only dream of achieving.
Comments are closed
Biggest fucking lemon ever built. A government project at its worst--three thousand different people all insisting the Shuttle meet their specific needs or ideas--regardless of the science. Three thousand ridiculous compromises.
In the end, an incredibly expensive thing that meets no one's needs, really has no point, and every now and then, explodes with a crew on board.
Well, at least it gets people to watch the launches. You know, for whatever reason...