
The Space Shuttle’s Controversial Launch Abort Plan - ironchief
http://www.tested.com/science/space/460233-space-shuttles-controversial-launch-abort-plan/
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Pinckney
Still not as crazy as the planned Lunar Escape Systems.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Escape_Systems](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Escape_Systems)

"There was no mass or power available in the LESS for an Inertial Measurement
Unit to measure acceleration and tell the astronauts where they were, where
they were going or how fast they would be getting there, or even for a radar
altimeter to show altitude above the lunar surface."

~~~
bpowah
In the same vein, there was the proposed MOOSE reentry system:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOOSE](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOOSE)

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Ankaios
If I had a spare billion bucks laying around when the shuttle program ended, I
thought it would been fun to actually try out an RTLS. Tie up the necessary
loose ends on the autopilot, stack up an empty shuttle, invite a lot of
people, and let it go. No real use to it, but it would have been a great "Hey
y'all, watch this" moment.

~~~
Shivetya
I get images of Topgears Renault Robin space shuttle clone in my head. While
obviously not hitting the heights the shuttle can it was an impressive
endeavor that might satisfy your curiosity; [http://youtu.be/pJdrlWR-
yFM](http://youtu.be/pJdrlWR-yFM)

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simonh
A classic TG moment. I still meet people that think that was real.

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lotsofmangos
Top Gear (along with Fox News), hold the dubious honour of having had to
defend themselves in court for their right to lie in segments presented as
factual reporting. This is probably part of the reason why they moved away
from car reviews and onto doing stunts.

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shirro
Almost as good as sliding 200ft from the base of an exploding Saturn V to a
rubber room, a quick crawl to the blast room, slam the door shut, cover
yourself in a fire blanket and if you survive long enough light oxygen candles
until the rescuers arrive.
[http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n1211/19rubberroom/](http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n1211/19rubberroom/)

~~~
z3ugma
This photo from that series
[http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n1211/19rubberroom/full15...](http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n1211/19rubberroom/full15.jpg)
looks like something straight out of Half-Life. After reading the article on
STS-1, that doesn't seem too far off.

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gedmark
Insane is a better word for it. Although to be fair there are a lot of aspects
of the shuttle's design and operation that will be remembered that way.

He even glosses over the SRB issue. Thanks to the SRB's, there were no abort
modes for the shuttle during the first 123 seconds. Until they had expended
themselves any abort would have required separating the SRB's while they were
still firing at full thrust. They would have accelerated forward of the stack,
their hot exhaust impinging directly on the external tank while it was still
full of fuel.

The RTLS was insane, but I don't think it comes close to the madness of STS-1:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-1](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-1)

That flight will go down in history as the only time anyone was dumb enough to
put people on top of a rocket _on its very first flight_.

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mrbill
Also related - "Shuttle Down" by Harry Stine:

"In the book, the Space Shuttle Atlantis launches on a polar orbit flight from
Vandenberg Air Force Base in Southern California. During the launch, the main
engines cut off prematurely and the shuttle is forced to make an emergency
landing on Rapa Nui, better known to most of the world as Easter Island."

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuttle_Down](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuttle_Down)

~~~
mrbill
"In addition, astronauts now carry passports and other documents, including
traveller's cheques, in case of emergency landings."

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jloughry
Maciej Ceglowski put it best:

 _" You know you're in trouble when the Russians are adding safety features to
your design."_ [1]

[1]
[http://www.idlewords.com/2005/08/a_rocket_to_nowhere.htm#5](http://www.idlewords.com/2005/08/a_rocket_to_nowhere.htm#5)

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Narkov
Surely more controversial would be the range safety "Flight Termiantion" (i.e.
self destruct) option?

[http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/space/nasa/4262479](http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/space/nasa/4262479)

~~~
dlgeek
Not really. The controversy here is over whether or not it would work if they
needed it. Range safety is something everyone agreed with the necessity of,
and there wasn't a lot of concern that it wouldn't work. (It was basically a
small explosive charge sitting on the SRB and a radio control - very well
understood).

The RTLS abort mode, everyone agreed was necessary (in the "no other options"
sense, but as the article explains, no one can be sure it would actually work.

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drpancake
I grew up in the English countryside a few miles away from a US airbase which
was designated as one of the possible landing sites in the event of an aborted
launch, due to it's long runway.

There was an American couple living in our village and the guy's job was to be
on call during a shuttle launch. Suffice it to say he and his buddies spent
most of their days playing poker.

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ZoFreX
Which airbase, out of interest?

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drpancake
Fairford.

~~~
dingaling
Shannon on the west coast of Ireland was also a designated emergency field.

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jpdus
Somewhat related and another great read - the detailed plan for a never-
launched Columbia rescue mission (including a space shuttle rendezvous):

[http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/02/the-audacious-
rescue-...](http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/02/the-audacious-rescue-plan-
that-might-have-saved-space-shuttle-columbia/)

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boxcardavin
I wrote a paper while I was doing my phys/astro degree on why the shuttle was
bad for the US space program. This was a major reason for it because every
accident was guaranteed death for the astronauts, which then guaranteed a
shutdown of all manned launches for months. NASA has been cash-strapped since
the 70s but they can still absorb and recover from lost rockets (with
astronauts ejected vertically), whereas lost life leaves a scar on the
organization.

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adamwong246
I wonder if this maneuver could be performed in that Kerbal Space Program
game?

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potatolicious
Definitely. KSP doesn't really model aerodynamics, nor re-entry heat, and has
a fairly simplistic model for stresses between components.

You can almost certainly RTLS successfully in a KSP version of the shuttle
because the game conveniently doesn't simulate the hard parts ;)

Now, KSP with the Deadly Reentry mod and the FAR aerodynamics mod would make
the exercise much harder.

~~~
exDM69
You're right that KSP physics would make it a bit easier than in real life.
Even with FAR aerodynamics and Deadly re-entry it would probably be somewhat
possible.

But Kerbal Space Program has very crude instruments and controls (especially
when using the keyboard). It is very difficult to fly any kind of aircraft let
alone gliders.

Perhaps using the built-in flight assists in FAR to maintain a steady pitch
trim you could try to make it. But you'd still need to understand the best
glide airspeed and other aerodynamic characteristics of the craft to make a
deadstick landing.

It might be possible but extremely difficult to pull off an RTLS abort
maneuver in KSP.

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canjobear
I found it very difficult to picture what exactly was supposed to go on in
each maneuver based on the text. It would help to have more diagrams and to
move the diagram near the bottom up to the top. The simulation video also
didn't help, because it was in a first-person view for all of the interesting
parts.

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pdonis
From the article:

 _" Of the 135 Space Shuttle launches, only one (STS-51F on 7/29/85)
experienced an abort-inducing failure during ascent. In the case of 51F, they
safely made a lower-than-planned orbit and carried out the mission. All of the
other flights cleanly avoided the dubious honor of settling the RTLS bet."_

All but one. Did the writer just forget about the Challenger mission, or did
that one somehow count as "cleanly avoiding" an "abort-inducing failure"?

(Someone in the comments to the article has brought this up as well.)

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jychang
Challenger never got to RTLS, so yeah, it cleanly avoided settling the bet.

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pdonis
I think this is a very...nuanced...interpretation of "cleanly avoid".

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rplnt
> Mind = blown.

What an unfortunate "sentence" in otherwise very informative and captivating
article.

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geetee
I hope you're able to recover and move on from this.

