Ken Murphy is looking for submittals for next week’s Carnival of Space.

As we approach the anniversary in October next year, there will be a lot of perspective, and prospective pieces like this one by (fellow) baby boomer Keith Cowing. I’ll no doubt do one or two of my own.

They’ve found a cause, and solution to the foam-falling problem that gouged the tiles on the last flight. I wasn’t sure they’d be able to do it at all, let alone this quickly. On the other hand, I think they could have continued to fly with it as is, and if they hadn’t found a solution, they should have. If it occurred again, it would only be a real problem on the Hubble mission.

I in fact think that the Shuttle is now about as safe as it can be made, and it’s in fact pretty safe. I’ll be very surprised if they lose another orbiter before they retire it. But even if I’m right, that’s no reason to not retire it (though many will attempt to keep it alive). I’ve never thought it should be retired for safety reasons (at least not because it kills astronauts occasionally). We lose people mining, in construction, driving, and even in recreation. The notion that we can’t afford to do so in space is silly. And in fact it’s ridiculous, when we’re losing people fighting a war, to argue that we can’t afford to do so to open a frontier. If we, as a nation, can’t grow up about this, and think that it’s not worth losing people occasionally. we should just give up.

As I’ve noted previously, and recently, the real problem with an unreliable Shuttle is that we can’t spare the vehicles. A reusable vehicle that’s not reliable isn’t affordable (one of the reasons that talking about “human rating” one is oxymoronic, and misses the point). And the real problem with Shuttle isn’t that it’s unsafe, but that it costs too much, for too little. There are a lot more useful things that we could be doing in space for that billion dollars per flight. Unfortunately, NASA is replacing it with a system that will be no improvement at all in that regard.

Emily Lakdawalla has the Seventeenth Edition.

I haven’t commented on this, but the New Scientist has a fairly extensive story of Armadillo’s bad weekend.

What do I think?

First of all, full disclosure. I’m working, as I write this, for one of Armadillo’s competitors, on SBIR proposals. But it’s a close-knit community, even among the competitors.

And having said that, I don’t think it’s a disaster for Armadillo. These kinds of things are going to happen along the way, as we start to understand how to develop operable and affordable space transports (a goal that has eluded both the military and NASA, almost half a century after the dawn of the space age). I also find it interesting (and I have to confess, somewhat amusing) that the failure was fundamentally a software failure, given the pedigree of the company that provided the funds that created the vehicle:

Post-crash analysis has revealed what went wrong

I haven’t commented on this, but the New Scientist has a fairly extensive story of Armadillo’s bad weekend.

What do I think?

First of all, full disclosure. I’m working, as I write this, for one of Armadillo’s competitors, on SBIR proposals. But it’s a close-knit community, even among the competitors.

And having said that, I don’t think it’s a disaster for Armadillo. These kinds of things are going to happen along the way, as we start to understand how to develop operable and affordable space transports (a goal that has eluded both the military and NASA, almost half a century after the dawn of the space age). I also find it interesting (and I have to confess, somewhat amusing) that the failure was fundamentally a software failure, given the pedigree of the company that provided the funds that created the vehicle:

Post-crash analysis has revealed what went wrong

I haven’t commented on this, but the New Scientist has a fairly extensive story of Armadillo’s bad weekend.

What do I think?

First of all, full disclosure. I’m working, as I write this, for one of Armadillo’s competitors, on SBIR proposals. But it’s a close-knit community, even among the competitors.

And having said that, I don’t think it’s a disaster for Armadillo. These kinds of things are going to happen along the way, as we start to understand how to develop operable and affordable space transports (a goal that has eluded both the military and NASA, almost half a century after the dawn of the space age). I also find it interesting (and I have to confess, somewhat amusing) that the failure was fundamentally a software failure, given the pedigree of the company that provided the funds that created the vehicle:

Post-crash analysis has revealed what went wrong

Since it did the deorbit burn about half an hour ago, Endeavour should be starting to test its tiles right about now. Hoping for the best.

[Update a few minutes later]

Apparently they came through entry all right. Landing in a few minutes. It will be interesting to see the extent of the belly damage once they reach the ground.

[Update a few minutes prior to landing]

I just heard the double sonic boom. It rattled the house. I’ve never heard one in Florida before. The last time I did was in California, on an Edwards landing. I guess they were approaching the Cape from the south.

[Update]

The vehicle just rolled (apparently safely) to a stop.

[Post-flight update]

Interesting unintended consequences, if it turns out to be the case:

While the resulting damage was later found to pose no risk to the safe return of the orbiter or its seven-astronaut crew, NASA has found similar foam shedding events on its last few shuttle flights. The damage from any such foam loss to an orbiter’s heat shield is not believed to be catastrophic, like that which led to the 2003 Columbia accident, but engineers are analyzing it just to be sure, Hale said.

The increased frequency has prompted speculation that an extra hour added to launch countdowns – to allow inspections teams to scan shuttle fuel tanks for ice build-up – may actually contribute to ice formation that ultimately cracks or looses foam debris.

There are no risk-free choices.

Is it just me, or is this Onion piece on space tourism uncharacteristically lame?

There’s been a very interesting discussion in comments over at Space Politics about VSE, ESAS, and public perception. Jim Muncy challenges us to an exercise:

I would respectfully request everyone ask themselves two separate and distinct questions. Answer them independently, in any order you want.

1) As a prelude, add any