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germanbird writes:
"ArsTechnica has published a story taking a look at NASA's theoretical rescue plan for the space shuttle Columbia. The ambitious yet plausible plan was included as part of the report prepared during the investigation after the shuttle was lost during re-entry. I appreciate the author's perspective and his analysis of things as a sys-admin at Boeing he was much closer to the situation than most of us were. I for one would have liked to see the men and women at NASA given the chance to try to pull this one off, but I'm not sure it would have been worth the risk to the rescue team or even possible given the compressed schedule."
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NASA's Theoretical Rescue Plan for Columbia
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(Score: 2, Insightful) by The Grim Reefer on Friday February 28 2014, @09:29PM
I agree. Doing so would have been more likely to endanger more astronauts than anything.
Additionally, I didn't think NASA even knew there was a problem until Columbia broke up during reentry. No one knew about the damage to the heat shield until after it happened. So this is really a moot point.
(Score: 2, Informative) by quacking duck on Saturday March 01 2014, @01:11AM
Some in NASA suspected a more serious problem and wanted to request help from the US military for some visual inspection by spy satellites, but no formal request was made:
"Wayne Hale, a senior flight director now serving as launch integration manager at the Kennedy Space Center, made inquiries about the possibility of Air Force help inspecting Columbia. But those initial efforts were terminated by senior management"
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/shuttle/sts107/03031 4readdy/ [spaceflightnow.com]
(Score: 2, Informative) by germanbird on Saturday March 01 2014, @06:24AM
From what I've read, they had some idea that there could be a problem. However, I don't think the extent of it was known until it was too late.
Apparently during the accident review, they actually fired foam blocks at spare wing panels to try to recreate the problem. Most of the impacts only caused surface damage or cracks. After further analysis of the flight data, they were able to narrow down the impact site and fired a block of foam that create a hole approximately 16 in x 16 in the panel. (See Columbia Disaster: Columbia Accident Investigation Board [wikipedia.org] for details.) So unfortunately for Columbia (and I guess fortunately for all the other shuttle missions that came before it), this appears to have been a very improbably accident.
I think you guys are right, though, a rescue mission probably would have just put more lives at risk. However, I would hate to have been the guy to make that call knowing that the lives of the astronauts in orbit were on the line.