Good old NASA

[RichieB16]

the sad fact, is NASA and the russians space officials, would rather risk the lifes of the astronauts than cost themselves millions in cancelling or delaying a mission, if its a small problem that is.

I don't think they neccessarily think about the possible results of what they are doing.

[Craig.]

well as you have stated, they have on numerous occasions done this. they have had numerous wake up calls, and still ignored them, and this is one of the most dangerous professions. There is absolutly NO excuse to get lazy with any part of it, no matter if it never has an accident. And as soon as they do start having these problems, they should be fired and a more responsible person be brought in.

[RichieB16]

I agree completely, one thing I don't like is how many flights they do per year-if you look at the years just before the accidents, you can see that they start launching a ton of shuttles and then one is lost.  They start out slow again, but soon enough they do it again and another is lost.  For example-here is the numbers of shuttle launches per year, you can see how they beign to launch way to many and then they have problems.

1981: 2
1982: 3
1983: 4
1984: 5
1985: 9
1986: 2 (Challenger explodes 1/28/86)
1987: none
1988: 2
1989: 5
1990: 6
1991: 6
1992: 8
1993: 7
1994: 7
1995: 7
1996: 7
1997: 8
1998: 5
1999: 3
2000: 5
2001: 6
2002: 5
2003: 1 (Columbia breaks up 2/1/03)
2004: none

This is especially visible before Challenger, but this shows how routine shuttle launches became.  In the 90s they managed to have 6 or 7 launches per year and they never had a problem.  But, eventually at that pace safety will be compromised.  As a result, accidents happen.

[Hagar]

I'm not particulaly interested in the space programme but we're talking about the basic airframe. This is nothing high-tech but simple mechanics. The rudder is used as a conventional split airbrake after re-entry & during landings.



Split control surfaces have been used for years on various types of aircraft. If this was a civil airliner those actuators would be overhauled or replaced on a regular basis. I still find it hard to believe that the basic airframe systems are not subject to a regular maintenance schedule as with any ordinary aircraft. This makes me wonder what else has been conveniently overlooked.

Beutel said it takes many months of work to remove the actuators and install new ones. Michael Kostelnik, NASA deputy associate administrator for the space shuttle and space station programs, told the NASA Advisory Council at a March 10 meeting in Huntsville, Ala. that the space agency was considering a repair option that, if all did not go well, could delay the shuttle's return to flight as much as nine months beyond next March.

But the next day, NASA officials decided to take a more conservative approach. Beutel said NASA is now assuming that Endeavour's actuators are flawed until convinced otherwise and has asked Hamilton Sundstrand to manufacture enough new parts for three orbiters. Discovery's actuators -- spares that have never flown -- have been returned to Hamilton Sundstrand for refurbishment and are due back to NASA by May.

http://www.space.com/spacenews/businessmonday_040322.html

[RichieB16]

That bugs me too.  Especially because they have Orbiter Maintence Down Periods every so many missions (I think every 10 for each orbiter).  Theyare supposed to tear the shuttle completely down and rebuild it in order to replace old parts and correct problems.  If it hadn't been found during general maintence, you'd think they would have the problem during at least one of the down periods.  They've had like 10 of them total by now and since every orbiter had this mistake on them, I would have expected them to find it by now.  What I wonder is how many other screw ups like this have been found over the years and simply fixed without the press finding out.