Author Topic: Challenger accident (Read 1182 times)

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #30 on:** January 28, 2005, 10:21:43 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by eagl
Grun

You don't want to know. I've read enough of the mishap report to not want to know more. Nothing damning in there that didn't make it to the public, but some of the other details are pretty sad and upsetting.

Thing is and no offence but I think we do want to know.
I know I certainly do.
Again no offence to you but I hate when the media or government decides to protect us and not to tell or show us something under the guise of "you dont want to know"
Cause yea, I do want to know.

What I really also want to know is exactly what they did find during the recovery. All that was made hush hush very quickly and very little information was ever released about it.
I remember only little bits and snippets were ever told and then they buried the whole kit n kaboodle underground somewhere.

As for where I was when it happened. I had brought a buddy's sister to her doctors appointment and he and I were sitting in my car int he parking lot listening to Howard Stern (thats when Stern was really good) And Gary broke in and announced that the Challanger had blown up. I remember my buddy and I just staring at each other with astounded looks on our faces and both of us just wanting her to come out so we could go to my place and get to a TV.
For days afterwords I had recorded it on the VCR and watched and rewatched it in slo mo and pausing and going in slo frame advance so as to try to see exactly what happened.
I was quite traumatised by it having grown up with the space program and watching all the apollo missions on TV when I was a kid I followed the space program pretty closely.
I think for alot of us that grew up in that era when it blew up a peice of us blew up with it

Halo · « **Reply #31 on:** January 28, 2005, 11:53:24 PM »

Was watching the Challenger launch live in the office conference room on a new large TV I had just bought for the organization. Had to go tell the boss what happened.

We knew the accident potential always was there, but it was still shocking to see it happen. And just when NASA was starting to fly teachers to show how routine, safe, and educational space flight was becoming.

The Space Shuttle was never as glamorous as the Pan Am spaceliner in the movie 2001, but the workhorse is still with us in 2005 and the spaceliner never was.

Captain Virgil Hilts · « **Reply #32 on:** January 29, 2005, 02:00:01 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by DREDIOCK
Thing is and no offence but I think we do want to know.
I know I certainly do.
Again no offence to you but I hate when the media or government decides to protect us and not to tell or show us something under the guise of "you dont want to know"
Cause yea, I do want to know.

What I really also want to know is exactly what they did find during the recovery. All that was made hush hush very quickly and very little information was ever released about it.
I remember only little bits and snippets were ever told and then they buried the whole kit n kaboodle underground somewhere.

If you really want to know what happened and why, look at the link in my first post in this thread. Or simply Google "Morton Thiokol".

Oh, what the Hell, here it is again:

Morton Thiokol and NASA on the Challenger Disaster

Read it carefully, it is written by an engineer who was involved, and tried desperately to stop the launch, and then tried desperately to make the truth known. The guy paid a high price for trying to do the right thing, over and over, and still carries guilt over not being able to stop the launch or fix the problem.

68Hall · « **Reply #33 on:** January 29, 2005, 02:05:37 AM »

Senior year of high school here in fla. It could be seen veryu well. Man I'm getting old.

eagl · « **Reply #34 on:** January 29, 2005, 06:52:21 AM »

Dreidock,

Take it up with the supreme court. They've ruled several times on the issue of privacy and privledged information that comes out of accident and safety investigations.

Admit it, you really want to know if there were any survivors from the initial blast, and if so, if they spent their time plummeting to earth screaming in terror, praying, telling their familes they loved them, or riding it out in silence. Sorry dude, it's really none of your business.

The sanctity of "privledge" is the single strongest weapon in the safety world, both civilian and military. Without it, we'd be doomed to repeat the same fatal mistakes over and over. With it, we can save lives. We have proof that it works, and the supreme court has agreed in multiple cases. Without privledge, there would be no cockpit voice recorders. There would be no corporate disclosure during investigations without court orders. There would be no information passing whatsoever because someone ordered to disclose information in an adversarial proceeding can always take the 5th regardless.

It's important to know that safety privledge does NOT cover criminal behavior, so it's not a way for people to cover their butts either.

DREDIOCK · « **Reply #35 on:** January 29, 2005, 07:54:38 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by eagl
Dreidock,

Admit it, you really want to know if there were any survivors from the initial blast, and if so, if they spent their time plummeting to earth screaming in terror, praying, telling their familes they loved them, or riding it out in silence. Sorry dude, it's really none of your business.

Eagl, Go screw yourself.
I want to know the truth. And if thats part of it then theat part of it. But I want to know the truth.
I dont need or want to be protected from the truth by the media, the government or anyone alse.

I'd always assumed there were survivors of the initial blast. Although I highly doubt they survived past impact.
So that really not a big part of the issue, and not what I was stating or even asking about.

lazs2 · « **Reply #36 on:** January 29, 2005, 10:35:23 AM »

only whitehawk and a few people on the internet know what really happened.

lazs

Captain Virgil Hilts · « **Reply #37 on:** January 29, 2005, 02:43:37 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by DREDIOCK
Eagl, Go screw yourself.
I want to know the truth. And if thats part of it then theat part of it. But I want to know the truth.
I dont need or want to be protected from the truth by the media, the government or anyone alse.

I'd always assumed there were survivors of the initial blast. Although I highly doubt they survived past impact.
So that really not a big part of the issue, and not what I was stating or even asking about.

There MAY have been survivors of the initial blast, but it is hardly likely. According to Richard Finch, who writes the welding regulations for NASA and the FAA, the space shuttle crew compartment that is used during launch and re entry is made of 6061-T6 aluminum, and as mostly made to insulate from heat, and contain enough atmosphere for them to occupy it even without their suits. However, it is ill suited for protection from shock and pressure waves, especially from a blast the size of the one that destroyed the shuttle. Unlike the pressure hull of a submarine, it is not designed to withstand great external pressure. Even if the compartment did not deform or partially implode, it is most likely that the shock wave subjected the crew to G forces that are not surviveable and most often result in instant death (the brain is smashed against the skull, and the brain stem sheared away at least partially if not fully).

In any event, the most important thing is to understand the chain of events that caused it to happen in the first place. Evidently the lessons were NOT learned, otherwise we would not have had another shuttle lost, this one on re entry. It seems that NASA and the contractors have become far too complacent given the seriousness of the consequences when mistakes are made when dealing with the extreme forces and environments related to space travel. The first disaster should have been MORE than enough to prevent future disasters. The order of magnitude at which even the smallest problems are amplified by the extreme nature of space travel should have been obvious enough that known problems like the Morton Thiokol "O" rings should have never been allowed to exist once discovered by ANYONE, no matter what the cost of fixing the problem was. Nevermind the ongoing problems with ice and foam trashing the tiles that were always known to be essential for the survival of the vehicle and the crew.

Sandman · « **Reply #38 on:** January 29, 2005, 03:16:46 PM »

I was onboard the U.S.S. Leahy (CG-16), somewhere in the Pacific Ocean and knew absolutely nothing about it until a few hours after it happened.

Lizking · « **Reply #39 on:** January 29, 2005, 03:25:24 PM »

There was no large explosion, per se, it was a cloud of escaping gases. 3 of the portable air supply tanks were manually turned on, so it can be assumed that at least three of the astronauts lived through the inital event, and probably lived until impact. Google it, and you will find a millisecond by millisecond timeline, videos and more information than you ever want to know, all from offical government sites.

FUNKED1 · « **Reply #40 on:** January 29, 2005, 04:28:30 PM »

http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/missions/51-l/docs/kerwin.txt

Sixpence · « **Reply #41 on:** January 29, 2005, 11:41:10 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by FUNKED1
I watched it happen live, which is probably why I am completely jaded to disaster/injury/death footage.

Ditto, I was living in St Pete working for a contractor who installed wallpaper. We were working in Sarasota for a couple of days working at a small hotel and sleeping there overnight. The last night just a foreman and I had stayed behind to finish up the next morning. We woke to a very cold day. I was from the north, but this cold went right through me. It was still humid but cold, chilled right to the bone, coldest day I can remember down there.

We finished up and loaded the van. We were at the top of the Skyway bridge where it rises 150 feet(only one span was up, one span had fallen when a ship hit it in a fog in '81', the new one was being built) and noticed the pillar of cloud(it is very large, even from across the state). I was a big fan of science and space and could not hold my excitement "Look!, the Shuttle!". Then the cloud split in two halfway into the sky, by boss was confused as was I. " Maybe the booster rockets disengaged early" I said. We didn't have the radio on, and never did the thought cross our minds that something may have gone wrong.

We drove on and saw cars by the side of the road with binocs and scopes(the usual during a launch). We pulled into a service station(store/gas) to fuel up, as we pulled in we noticed inside the store was packed with people. My boss went in to pay for the gas, when he came back he told me the news, I was shocked. I quickly turned the radio on and heard the grim details. I remember looking out the window and seeing the pillar of cloud, it lingers for awhile after the launch, it was the only cloud in the sky. I will never forget that day, it is forever etched in my memory.

Wolfala · « **Reply #42 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:28:55 AM »

I was 6, sitting on the couch watching the TV with mom before going to kindergarden. It went up and blew - mom was silent but she didn't need to tell me anything. I had enough books on planes and rockets by that time to know what happened.

Whenever I see that video with the audio, for me it is yesterday on that couch.

Wolfala

P.S.

I found an interesting quote from the IEEE ethics guide that I believe in particularly important.

"Engineers have a responsibility that goes far beyond the building of machines and systems. We cannot leave it to the technical illiterates, or even to literate and overloaded technical administrators to decide what is safe and for the public good. We must tell what we know, first through normal administrative channels, but when these fail, through whatever avenues we can find. Many claim that it is disloyal to protest. Sometimes the penalty disapproval, loss of status, even Vilification--can be severe. Today we need more critical pronouncements and published declarations by engineers in high professional responsibilities. In some instances, such criticism must be severe if we are properly to serve mankind and preserve our freedom. Hence it is of the utmost importance that we maintain our freedom of communication in the engineering profession and to the public. The decades ahead are bound to be a critical and difficult period and there will be occasions for sharp dissent and strong words if we are to meet our responsibilities."

mechanic · « **Reply #43 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:11:53 AM »

brave humans.

I was only 3 years old when it happened. believe it or not i remember my parents watching it (wow, that means i remember having a family that was together once too!) and have the image burnt into my mind.

i clearly remember my 2nd birthday also, what i got ( a book of three stories, treasure island, robinson crusoe and gullivers travells) who was there ( next door girl, same age, life long friend, parents, baby bro, granma)
im just glad my outstanding longterm memory doesnt go back a few years further......imagine fighting for stretching space with 3,000,000,000 other little Camerons!