Xref: utzoo sci.space:6720 sci.space.shuttle:1118
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.space.shuttle
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: space news from July 11 AW&ST
Message-ID: <1988Aug29.172104.10823@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <1988Aug16.040406.5434@utzoo.uucp> <6137@dasys1.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 29 Aug 88 17:21:04 GMT

In article <6137@dasys1.UUCP> tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff) writes:
>Excuse me, but are we really supposed to believe that omitting the
>flight crew makes using the old SRBs an acceptable risk?

Rationally, you have a point.  Congress is not rational.  Losing hardware
is troublesome, but it would not be anything like the political disaster
that more dead astronauts would be.

>Challenger is
>every bit as "dead" as its crew, and we cannot afford to lose another
>orbiter under any circumstances...

Then we'll have to ground the shuttle permanently.  There is no way to
fly it without risking loss of another orbiter.  The NRC report on
shuttle frequency put it even more strongly:  if the shuttle continues
flying, another orbiter *WILL* be lost eventually.
-- 
Intel CPUs are not defective,  |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
they just act that way.        | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu