Ejection seats and shuttles…

Now as to whether the Russians did or did not finish Buran is actually moot, they did design in ejection seats as did NASA during the design.

Only one reason the ejection seats were taken out of the Shuttle… bad form to have the drivers with bang seats and the passengers with nothing but a prayer.

Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good.

So we are back to the basic design elements. Most dangerous time in a space flight is immidiately after launch or during re-entry.

Re-entry is a non survivable accident so no point sweating that, but the launch accidents are far more common and can  and are survivable.

If the missions were being flown with the actual crew needed to complete the mission, Pilot and Co-Pilot, both could have banged out of Challenger after the explosion and possibly survived. The Gemini capsule also provided the crew with ejector seats.


NASA needs to design vehicles on mission needs rather than PR needs… Shuttle was a PR need driven design, ARES has gone back to mission needs.

Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good.

I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Were the crews sometimes bigger than they needed to be? Yes, but that was due in large part to the amount of science they wanted to get done on a mission. If we could have gone up more often that may have been avoided.

Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good.

The shuttle had to be manned up until design changes after the Columbia incident.  The landing gear deployment was manual (NASA feared the computer would shoot the wheels out at the wrong time, cause too much drag and land short of the runway) until they realized they might need to drop a shuttle without its crew onto a nice long strip in the middle of nowhere.  They added a connection cable to let the computer drop the wheels.

Kharn

Quoted: From the NASA report - and an important fact: During the period of the flight when the Solid Rocket Boosters are thrusting, there are no survivable abort options. No matter what they were wearing or emergency equipment they had, the Shuttle crew was doomed. The only thing pressure suits would have done is kept the crew alive long enough to hit the water. Av.

I don't think anyone here was making the claim that a pressure suit would have saved the lives of the Challenger crew. Why bother giving them an emergency air supply system for launch if it will not do a damned thing in the event the cabin looses pressure during liftoff? Waste of weight and space. This is why after the accident NASA gave the crew pressure suits.

The only thing that would have saved them is if they held the launch. There were plenty of warning signs,  but PR, and business contracts trumped rational thought.

Quoted: Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good. I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Were the crews sometimes bigger than they needed to be? Yes, but that was due in large part to the amount of science they wanted to get done on a mission. If we could have gone up more often that may have been avoided.

I'm old enough to remember when NASA were claiming they'd be turning round and relaunching Shuttles every couple of weeks.

Even at the time, many were arguing it wasn't going to happen and NASA should have just churned out the proven and reliable Saturn IB like sausages as per the Russians and their equally proven and reliable Soyuz.

The Shuttle is going the way of the Dodo and the Soyuz will still be soldiering on taking people up to the ISS for far less per shot than the Shuttle ever managed.

Personally, I think the Shuttle effectively put NASA out of the space race when they were pre-eminent in the 70's with their Saturn V's and IB's. It promised much, delivered little and costed far too much.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good. I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Were the crews sometimes bigger than they needed to be? Yes, but that was due in large part to the amount of science they wanted to get done on a mission. If we could have gone up more often that may have been avoided. I'm old enough to remember when NASA were claiming they'd be turning round and relaunching Shuttles every couple of weeks. Even at the time, many were arguing it wasn't going to happen and NASA should have just churned out the proven and reliable Saturn IB like sausages as per the Russians and their equally proven and reliable Soyuz. The Shuttle is going the way of the Dodo and the Soyuz will still be soldiering on taking people up to the ISS for far less per shot than the Shuttle ever managed. Personally, I think the Shuttle effectively put NASA out of the space race when they were pre-eminent in the 70's with their Saturn V's and IB's. It promised much, delivered little and costed far too much.

I agree with much of what you said, but you must admit the Shuttle and Buran both pioneered new achievements that may well build on future space accomplishments, like an actual pilotable reentry craft versus an unpiloted capsule that drops in with a parachute.

I know it sounds like science fiction, but think the day when we see armed craft orbiting the earth ready to shoot down enemy satellites or target ground objectives may come in the future. China has given a hint of the future space wars by showing they can easily shoot down one of their own satellites.

In this respect, every technology and lesson learned my be useful, expensive as it may be. just my opinion.

Quoted: I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Were the crews sometimes bigger than they needed to be? Yes, but that was due in large part to the amount of science they wanted to get done on a mission. If we could have gone up more often that may have been avoided.

Well, it was the amount of science to be performed in the relatively short on-orbit time of the mission. If you're needing to sample cultures on a round-the-clock basis for several different experiments, you need two or three shifts of one or two Mission Specialists. With a permanent space station, the workload over time can be managed much more effectively, instead of trying to cram a whole bunch of science into a 10-day window.

Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good.

Uh, the mission specialists and payload specialists are really quite necessary.

Who do you think works all that fancy stuff they put in the cargo bay?  And now that the shuttle actually shuttles, you've got to have space for passengers to go to/from space stations.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good. I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Were the crews sometimes bigger than they needed to be? Yes, but that was due in large part to the amount of science they wanted to get done on a mission. If we could have gone up more often that may have been avoided. I'm old enough to remember when NASA were claiming they'd be turning round and relaunching Shuttles every couple of weeks. Even at the time, many were arguing it wasn't going to happen and NASA should have just churned out the proven and reliable Saturn IB like sausages as per the Russians and their equally proven and reliable Soyuz. The Shuttle is going the way of the Dodo and the Soyuz will still be soldiering on taking people up to the ISS for far less per shot than the Shuttle ever managed. Personally, I think the Shuttle effectively put NASA out of the space race when they were pre-eminent in the 70's with their Saturn V's and IB's. It promised much, delivered little and costed far too much.

If I recall correctly, we can thank the military for the requirements that led to the shuttle instead of another capsule-based system.

Many people I've talked to refer to the new spacecraft designs (the CEV/Orion) as "what should have been our post-Apollo program," and in general I agree.  As long as you can dock in space, I don't see the need for a combined payload/human heavy lift vehicle.

Someday I think we will have spacecraft capable of repeatable ground-orbit-transorbit flight, but we have a long way to go.

By the way, I was reading up on the CEV/Orion design.

No fuel cells?  Solar only?  Carrying water instead of producing it?

Kind of surprising.  

Quoted: By the way, I was reading up on the CEV/Orion design. No fuel cells?  Solar only?  Carrying water instead of producing it? Kind of surprising.

Doesn't the Orion include the option of an RTG for power generation?

Quoted: No need to separate them from the stack, the orbiter - as far as I know - would just detach from the main fuel tank, and glide back to earth. (Yeah, right.) The range safety officer could blow up the SRBs.  They were blown up after Challenger exploded.

One of my college professors actually worked on the Return To Launch Site (RTLS) protocol for the shuttle.  He described it as requiring "3 miracles and an act of God" to actually work.  

He said they never even tested it, only simulated it, because it would either work or it wouldn't and if it didn't they'd have to scrap everything.

Quoted: If I recall correctly, we can thank the military for the requirements that led to the shuttle instead of another capsule-based system.

Yep, at one point the USAF wanted to be able to fly up and snag Russkie spy satellites and bring them back home.  The shuttle is still the only operational launch vehicle with the capability to bring a satellite back from orbit intact.

Quoted: Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good. Uh, the mission specialists and payload specialists are really quite necessary. Who do you think works all that fancy stuff they put in the cargo bay?  And now that the shuttle actually shuttles, you've got to have space for passengers to go to/from space stations.

Soyuz does it cheaper and safer… and NASA is going to be using Soyuz for quite some time yet.


Von Braun felt that NASA should have evolved the Saturn launcher… instead NASA threw away all that development work and designed a 'reusable space truck' that costs far more per pound than disposable launchers and now NASA is belatedly going back to the future with ARES.

NASA's 'Germans' understood the need for evolution in space travel, NASA's 'professional' engineeers that followed them seemed to have an absolute need for 'revolution' and damn the numbers.

NASA's dalliance with Shuttle effectively stopped any further manned exploration by NASA since the last moon landing in 1972. The Shuttle and ISS have become little more than 'we have to do something to justify the expense' projects. I think it's a shocking indictment of NASA's directors that it will be 50 years after Apollo 17 before Man returns to the Moon and then only by going back to basics and carrying on were Apollo left off. If he was still alive Von Braun would cry to see what became of his legacy.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reality is, the Shuttle could have been unmanned, Buran worked just fine under remote, for some missions you will need a manned pilot, but the downstairs passengers are nothing but that, passengers to make the missions look good. Uh, the mission specialists and payload specialists are really quite necessary. Who do you think works all that fancy stuff they put in the cargo bay?  And now that the shuttle actually shuttles, you've got to have space for passengers to go to/from space stations. Soyuz does it cheaper and safer… and NASA is going to be using Soyuz for quite some time yet. Von Braun felt that NASA should have evolved the Saturn launcher… instead NASA threw away all that development work and designed a 'reusable space truck' that costs far more per pound than disposable launchers and now NASA is belatedly going back to the future with ARES. NASA's 'Germans' understood the need for evolution in space travel, NASA's 'professional' engineeers that followed them seemed to have an absolute need for 'revolution' and damn the numbers. NASA's dalliance with Shuttle effectively stopped any further manned exploration by NASA since the last moon landing in 1972. The Shuttle and ISS have become little more than 'we have to do something to justify the expense' projects. I think it's a shocking indictment of NASA's directors that it will be 50 years after Apollo 17 before Man returns to the Moon and then only by going back to basics and carrying on were Apollo left off. If he was still alive Von Braun would cry to see what became of his legacy.

You are forgetting that NASA operates only on mandates from the Executive branch.  The shuttle was developed because the White House wanted a cheap way to deliver payload into space, not for the purposes of exploration.  Nixon put the kabosh on any further exploration out of earth orbit.  It wasn't until Bush announced the return to exploration outside of earth orbit that NASA changed its plan because its mandate had been changed.

Alot of blame is heaped on NASA, but you have to realize that they only do what they are told to do by the executive and what they are authorized to do (by funding) by the legislative branch.

When funding became an issue during the Nixon administration, the organization started downhill.

The military then intervened with the executive to cause the shuttle program to come into existence.

The shuttle served its purpose during the cold war.

After the end of the cold war, NASA wasn't given the funding to develop anything else.  That's the reason that we are where we are...it comes down to the power of the purse.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: You are forgetting that NASA operates only on mandates from the Executive branch.  The shuttle was developed because the White House wanted a cheap way to deliver payload into space, not for the purposes of exploration.  Nixon put the kabosh on any further exploration out of earth orbit.  It wasn't until Bush announced the return to exploration outside of earth orbit that NASA changed its plan because its mandate had been changed. Alot of blame is heaped on NASA, but you have to realize that they only do what they are told to do by the executive and what they are authorized to do (by funding) by the legislative branch. When funding became an issue during the Nixon administration, the organization started downhill. The military then intervened with the executive to cause the shuttle program to come into existence. The shuttle served its purpose during the cold war. After the end of the cold war, NASA wasn't given the funding to develop anything else.  That's the reason that we are where we are...it comes down to the power of the purse.

As I said, it was 'revolution and damn the numbers'…