Shaky Ground for 2010 Replacement Space Shuttle
“They know it’s a real problem,” said Carnegie Mellon University engineering professor Paul Fischbeck, who has consulted on risk issues with NASA in the past. “This thing is going to shake apart the whole structure, and they’ve got to solve it.”
A potentially dangerous situation is in the making for the new NASA space rockets that are meant to replace the aging space shuttles, with the launchings to begin for March 2015. Sending astronauts to the moon may not be feasible, as recent findings have shown the new space rocket could begin shaking so bad during the first couple of minutes after takeoff that the entire vehicle could be destroyed, according to the latest NASA report.
The shaking that could occur during this time is more of a problem to those who sit on top of the Orion, such as the crew in the crew capsule, the instrument unit, and the booster. The first stage involves five reusable solid rocket boosters–the same as NASA has used in the past to launch the shuttle–and will be built by ATK Launch Systems of Utah.
The Ares I rocket meant to lift the Orion crew capsule into orbit is the vehicle involved, with NASA officials hoping to fix the problem as early as this March for a 2020 goal of returning space astronauts to the moon. Not worried, NASA has worked out successful resolutions for technical problems in the pas, even though this one is particularly dangerous and is considered very serious. Not an uncommon thing for solid rocket boosters, the possible shaking problem involves added acceleration pulses that are caused by gas vortices in the rocket. It is similar to the wake that develops behind a fast-moving boat as it speeds along in the water. The gas vortices match the natural vibrating frequencies of the motor’s combustion chamber–which is what causes the shaking to occur.
At a cost of more than $100 billion dollars, the plan to return to the moon has occupied a lot of NASA’s time since 2005. The plan involves two rockets: Ares I would carry the returning astronauts into space, while Ares V is to be used as an unmanned heavy-lift cargo ship.
Professor Jorge Arenas of the Institute of Acoustics in Valdivia, Chile, acknowledged that the problem was serious but said, “NASA has developed one of the safest and risk- controlled space programs in engineering history.”
This entry was posted on Saturday, January 19th, 2008 at 6:33 am and is filed under Space Agency News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
