I don't know whether the question about what was apparently a "pyrotechnic" event just before the spent booster hit the water has been answered or not, but that is what it is. Last May I went to Florida and got to watch the launch of STS132, Atlantis, with a group from ATK Thiokol. A couple of days later we watched them tow the spent boosters back to the NASA facility to be disassembled and examined before they were returned to Utah to be refurbished and reused. The pyrotechnic you noticed and the object you saw hitting the water just before the spent booster hit the water was the nozzle itself. It is blasted off the end of the booster because the engineers say that the heavy nozzle would make it likely that the spent booster would hit the water nozzle first, if it were still attached. They think that if it hit water straight on, nozzle first, the shock would do so much damage to the rocket casings that they would not be able to re-use them. With the nozzles gone from the end of the boosters, divers have to insert plugs into the end of the boosters before they sink. When the plugs are in place, the boosters can be secured horizontally to the side of the ships which tow them back. Even this minuscule detail of the retrieval of the spent boosters is another very complex problem which needs to be attended to and it is nothing in the total scheme of things. I don't know how any of the shuttle flights are ever successful.
From: kimharch@cut.net To: utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com Date: Sun, 6 Mar 2011 22:53:19 -0700 Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Last Launch of Discovery
Thanks, Chris. Sounds like those are the elements that we saw "inflate" and peel away in the video that Patrick shared. Mystery solved? Maybe?
Kim
-----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Chris Sent: Sunday, March 06, 2011 10:49 PM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Last Launch of Discovery
On Sun, Mar 6, 2011 at 9:54 PM, Kim Hyatt <kimharch@cut.net> wrote:
Can you tell us where the relevant footage is?
Try this link, which should start playing at 36:15. The narrator mentions the Tyvek covers on the RCS engines.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFwqZ4qAUkE#t=36m15s _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Visit the Photo Gallery: http://www.slas.us/gallery2/main.php Visit the Wiki: http://www.utahastronomy.com
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