Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!microsoft!bobal
From: bobal@microsoft.UUCP (Bob Allison)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: LDEF
Summary: Solar Max goes, though
Message-ID: <8635@microsoft.UUCP>
Date: 6 Nov 89 21:12:11 GMT
References: <3115@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU> <1989Nov1.024354.6148@utzoo.uucp>
Reply-To: bobal@microsoft.UUCP (Bob Allison)
Organization: Microsoft Corp., Redmond WA
Lines: 23

In article <1989Nov1.024354.6148@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>
> [...]
>This is exactly what's going to happen in December.  Dual missions are
>not at all uncommon; for example, LDEF was launched by the same mission
>that repaired Solar Max.  (I saw it go up.  Quite different from watching
>on TV, even from the cheap seats far away from the pad.)
>
>Mind you, this particular mission should have been flown earlier.  Blame
>politics and the glacially-slow Challenger recovery.  As it is, it's going
>to be close for LDEF.

And we're losing Solar Max for sure.  Coming down in November-December I hear.
NASA thinks chunks ranging in size from 75 to 300 pounds could reach the 
surface.  Only a small land area is involved, though, and NASA estimates 
chances of a human being hit as 1 in 3800 (which sure seems high to me).  

That's one defect with designing a satellite which must be serviced by the 
shuttle at regular intervals (much less if we ever had a dozen up at once;
so far the plans only include HST and the space station as far as I know).

Bob Allison
uunet!microsoft!bobal