Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to disintegration timeline and crew compartment integrity

Some evidence, please?
Skeptical — (archived)

The first thing you need to understand is that originally Coumbia was equpped with explosive bolts that would have severed the crew compartment from the main body in case of re-entry failure. It was believed that the crew compartment was robust enough to survive intact to the point at which Columbia's ejection seats could be used.

Having been a space buff since before Columbia was first launched, and having read many of the discussion about the Columbia disaster on various boards and newsgroups last year, I have _never_ heard that before. I've read most of the Shuttle documents available on NASA's web site, and have never seen a hint of it before.

Can you back it up?

And I assume your argument is that all the post-Columbia analyses that talk about how/when the crew compartment might have failed after vehicle breakup are fraudulent and the result of conspiracies within NASA? Or has NASA too forgotten that the crew compartment was designed to re-enter on its own?

And what exactly is the point you are trying to make -- that NASA is lying and they survived down to parachute altitude and thus would have all lived if they still had ejection seats? That Ramon killed them all by opening the hatch too early and you think they could have all bailed out? That maybe they'd have gotten lucky and landed on a very large trampoline or pile of mattresses and all lived?

There's clearly a larger argument you have here but it's not clear to me what that is.

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