SYSMSH@ULKYVX.BITNET (02/01/86)
I was extremely interested to note Paul Dietz's comments that the explosion may have been due to a leak in the TDRS. An explanation like that would vindicate the shuttle system, and I'd suppose we'd all like to see that. I wonder if there IS any monitoring of the cargo area other than say, air pressure and environment? The one thing that bothers me about Paul's idea is the time the explosion occured, ie., right after throttle(sp) up. I'd like to see Paul speculate on why the hydrazine(or other leaking TDRS fuels) would have gone off such a short time after Scobie went to full thrust. Does anyone have any comments about the JPL's speculation that they actually did go into abort sequence (since the solid fuel boosters survived and veered off) ? If leaking fuel detonated in the cargo bay this might explain why we didn't see the orbiter veer off as well? There is talk on CNN today that sonar may have detected the cockpit component of the challenger. A lack of cargo bay remnants and presence of remnants of the front end might lend some support for Paul's idea. The more I think about it ect ect. Mark Hittinger/Systems Programmer/University of Louisville/Kentucky (bitnet: sysmsh@ulkyvx)
mcgeer%ji@UCBVAX.BERKELEY.EDU (Rick McGeer) (02/02/86)
From the size of the pieces of debris recovered, it now appears at least reasonably likely that Cmdr. Scobee detected a problem and jettisoned the ET and SRBs right at the blast; if true, this really is a tragedy another second and they'd've made it. -- Rick.
lls@ccice5.UUCP (Leo L. Stearns) (02/06/86)
In article <8602020131.AA07772@ji.berkeley.edu> mcgeer%ji@UCBVAX.BERKELEY.EDU (Rick McGeer) writes: > > From the size of the pieces of debris recovered, it now appears at >least reasonably likely that Cmdr. Scobee detected a problem and jettisoned >the ET and SRBs right at the blast; if true, this really is a tragedy >another second and they'd've made it. > > -- Rick. This may be total speculation, but. By now we've all seen the videos from both sides of Challenger during its' flight. The leak that appears to have occured in one of the SRBs was near the rear of the ship. This does not explain the flash seen under the crew compartment just before the explosion of the ET. The flash occured near where the shuttle is mounted to the ET. Is it possible that this flash was actually the explosive bolts being detonated? If the crew had released the ship from the ET, it would help explain the SRBs flying away seemingly intact and the press reports that the shuttle , at least partially, survived the initial explosion only to itself explode moments later. If I'm way off track on this one, tell me and I'll crawl back into my hole in the ground. :-) Leo Stearns lls@ccice5