Re: NASA HONORS LEGENDARY ASTRONAUT VANCE BRAND

Pat Flannery <flanner@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
news:11sdcujnf7qm0a0@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:

> Jim Oberg wrote:
>
>> It can even be argued that the most important lessons learned were
>>harmful. On Shuttle-Mir, NASA watched space crews dodge death on
>>almost a monthly basis and may have subconsciously absorbed the lesson
>>that since nobody had actually died, you could get sloppy with safety
>>reviews and it wouldn't ever bite you.
>>
> We'd learned that way pre-Shuttle/Mir. Our Shuttle crews were also
> able to "dodge death on almost a monthly basis" due to the defective
> field joints on the SRBs and the shedding foam on the ET. And we are
> way ahead of Russia in space fatalities at 14 to 4 respectively.

We are also way ahead of Russia in person-trips to space, 763 to 236
respectively. Which, not surprisingly, works out to about the same fatality
rate.

> As for life threatening situations on Mir, they had the fire, a near
> collision with a Progress, an actual collision with another Progress,
> The Soyuz thermal blanket shedding, and the big glycol leak. They had
> a lot of trouble with the orientation system and the air recycling
> system, but if worst came to worst, they could have always abandoned
> the station via the Soyuz, so those weren't life threatening.

Not in the case of the fire - it blocked the escape route to one of the two
Soyuzes, stranding half the crew if the fire had been more serious.

And not in the case of the collision, either. According to the commander
(Vasily Tsibliyev), the crew was unable to power up the Soyuz because its
batteries were drained. Had the Progress collided with Kvant or the base
module instead of Spektr, the crew would have died.

> After the ISS debacle, I'm fairly sure we won't be getting too cozy
> with Russia for some time to come.
> Assuming we had gone it alone and built the Freedom station, I still
> think we would be trying to figure out what exactly to do with it as
> the whole thing was a reaction by Reagan to the Russians launching
> Mir,

Incorrect. The space station program was initiated in 1984, two years
before the launch of Mir.

--
JRF

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