quote:On top of the usual launch and landing dangers, the Atlantis crew faces an estimated 1-in-185 chance that a piece of space junk or a micrometeoroid will cause catastrophic damage to their ship.
Holy crap! Those odds were nowhere near that high last time they serviced Hubble! I wonder if something happened or if they just revised the odds based on new data.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
I think they updated the odds because of all the floating space crap around the Hubble. It would be sad to have to abandon Atlantis in space, and have her crash into the pacific. Those things belong in museums once their service is up.
-------------------- "Kosh, I'd like to introduce you to our Resident schmuck and his side kick Kick Me."-Ritten
"Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity". -George Carlin
Registered: Jul 2007
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Daniel Butler
I'm a Singapore where is my boat
Member # 1689
posted
You know...maybe one of them. I don't think I'd shed a tear if the rest were junked, though. I mean they're all identical, aren't they? Or are they?
Registered: Jul 2005
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There are probably massive differences between shuttles, on the inside at least. I mean, you have the Enterprise at the Smithsonian, if I'm not mistaken, but it would be nice to have a few others in museums around the country, if not the world. Enterprise never actually made it into to space anyway. Perhaps NASA will keep one or two of them in mothball service, just in case they may be needed as a back-up vehicle someday, like in this case. I doubt that there will be 5 of the next generation shuttles ready in short order.
-------------------- "Kosh, I'd like to introduce you to our Resident schmuck and his side kick Kick Me."-Ritten
"Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity". -George Carlin
Registered: Jul 2007
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Once the shuttle program comes to an end, they'll be none in reserve status simply because all support hardware and facilities will be relegated to support Ares and Orion. And it would be difficult to near impossible to reconfigure to resupport a shuttle launch.
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Registered: Feb 2000
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You know, I should buy a Shuttle model and work it up like they did on Cowboy Bebop.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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I figure they should leave the shuttles in orbit. Big inhabitable spaces with consumable reserves. Make a fine waypoint for other vehicles.
-------------------- "This is why you people think I'm so unknowable. You don't listen!" - God, "God, the Devil and Bob"
Registered: Mar 1999
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How long would they stay in orbit with no one to pilot them, though? They'd run out of fuel eventually, even with remote piloting/orbit correction. And then what happens when the orbit decays? Look at all the debris that fell on the southern US after Columbia fell apart.
-------------------- "Don't fight forces; use them." --R. Buckminster Fuller
posted
You can't just leave the shuttles in orbit because... 1. You can't have a crewless launch. 2. For each manned launch, the crew of the shuttle's last mission would need to stay at ISS, for which there are not enough consumables. 3. There is also not enough space on a Soyuz capsule to send the shuttle crew back. 4. The ISS would need to ditch the shuttle so that another craft can dock. 5. A ditched shuttle would lose orbit eventually given that it would not be maintained by anyone.
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Registered: Feb 2000
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BTW, Michael Okuda apparently created the mission patch for STS-125, the mission to service Hubble. Look here.
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Registered: Feb 2000
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Shik
Starship database: completed; History of Starfleet: done; website: probably never
Member # 343
posted
We also see a new ENT-era Starfleet logo, new alien scripts, a Vulcan painting, a better shot of the TOS-R Orion ship, some glowy green blobby thing that looks like a ship, & now we know how & why "USS Botany Bay" was on a chart on West Wing.
I didn't know he did all the Constellation-related logos as well. That;'s pretty far out.
-------------------- "The French have a saying: 'mise en place'—keep everything in its fucking place!"
Registered: Jun 2000
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Essentially, it seems that if Atlantis is damaged, there are two options: The most likely is that they will go for a controlled destructive re-entry. But there's also a possibility for an automated landing procedure (think of Buran, which also flew auto-pilot) a Vandenberg or wherever.
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