Word: endeavour
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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There is no easy way to fix the gouge in the Shuttle Endeavour. In-orbit repair options are limited and, since any fix would have to be made by robotic arms and astronauts in awkward space suits, the process would be fraught with the potential to make the problem worse. Still, Mission team chairman John Shannon said that, according to his team's analysis, the damage should pose no risk to the astronaut crew on the return home. There is, however, potential for more damage to the shuttle itself on re-entry into Earth's atmosphere when temperatures...
...shuttle Columbia in February 2003, when superheated gases generated during reentry entered the ship through a breach in the insulation. Ever since then, astronauts have given their spacecraft a close visual inspection upon reaching orbit to look for any troublesome chips. On Sunday, a 3D laser imager attached to Endeavour's robotic arm revealed what could be a nasty...
...vessel's interior. What's more, the greater the number of tiles damaged by debris, the greater the jagged area exposed to the force of rentry - something which can, in theory, lead to a catastrophic peeling away of whole stretches of tiles. The comparative severity of the injury to Endeavour is leading NASA to conclude that it was probably denser ice, not comparatively light foam, that is responsible for the damage...
...Endeavour has plenty of things going for it. While the temperature in the vicinity of the wheel well grows blistering during reentry - on the order of 2,300 degrees Fahrenheit - that's a fair bit cooler than the 3,000 degrees reached at the spacecraft's nose and wingtips. Even damaged tiles can usually survive the heating at the aft end of the ship. NASA reports that it caught one bit of good luck in that the breach occurred right over a stretch of the aluminum framework of the ship itself - a bit like damaging a sheet-rock wall directly...
...lost to disaster in the 26 years of the program, but 117 have made it down just fine. And the large majority of those ships came home with scarred, pitted and missing tiles. Indeed, the early shuttles often shed tiles like dead leaves and landed safely all the same. Endeavour will almost surely do so too. But the anxiety this mission is causing is one more reason that so many NASA employees and astronaut families are simply marking time until shuttles' scheduled retirement in 2010, when the snakebit ships will fly no more...