Of tanks, foam and culture

I read the articles above. Discounting the range safety one as it was pre
Columbia, and I think, a different issue, I do feel that the one question
which is never going to be answered is,'how much foam can you lose'. Seems
to me that if you want to be brutally honest, there is a design flaw, and
all you can do is patch it up so that minimal size of the shed areas is
below catastrophic damage constraints. However, nobody really knows what
these parameters are.

The problem is that early in the program, the culture was far worse than
now, in that they flew it without detailed knowledge of what a big hit might
do, and they got away with it more than perhaps they had a right to.

Now however, you have on the one hand a commitment to finish the job of
building the space station, competition for funds, an aging vehicle and a
sudden awareness that you have an insurmountable problem.

If you then have people willing to fly it and everyone breathing down your
neck, what do you do?

Has anyone ...
A: found out what settlement you could get with the international partners
if you said you could not fulfil your part of the deal?
B: thought about seeing if any of the equipment could be flown on
conventional rockets?

Talked to the partners about some form of compromise where the US would pay
dev. costs for them to build a launcher to carry the parts to orbit.

Seems to me that the ISS is a white elephant itself, and maybe a smaller
system perhaps several, might be a better answer.

Brian

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Brian Gaff


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