A small 3-inch gouge on the belly of the Shuttle Endeavour was detected by observers on the International Space Station as the Shuttle passed by for a visual inspection before docking.
It’s not clear how serious this is; they will use the new, longer robotic arm to inspect the Shuttle on Sunday. it will use a laser to determine the depth and breadth of the gouge, along with several other suspicious marks. The big one is on the starboard side aft.
At just under a minute into the launch, a piece of debris — possibly ice from outside the external fuel tank — was seen striking the Shuttle near this position, and a small spray of debris was detected just after the impact.
The gouge isn’t as deep or as wide as others have been in the past where the Shuttle has landed safely, but of course any damage is cause for concern (especially after the 2003 loss of Columbia due to foam falling off the main tank and impacting the leading edge of the Shuttle wing, damaging the structure there).
More news can be found on the site NASASpaceflight.com
August 10th, 2007 at 10:49 pm
“The gouge isn’t as deep or as wide as others have been in the past where the Shuttle has landed safely, but of course any damage is cause for concern (especially after the 2003 loss of Columbia due to foam falling off the main tank and impacting the leading edge of the Shuttle wing, damaging the structure there).”
I hope that this problem is minor. And, moreover, that this present Shuttle Misson lands back on Earth as planned….
August 10th, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Whatever design(s) NASA and/or private corporations use for future orbital spacecraft, they NEED to make sure that the future designs do not have a large external tank that often drops pieces of insulation or ice onto the orbital part of the spacecraft at high speeds. That seems to cause more problems for the space shuttle than almost anything else.
August 11th, 2007 at 12:54 am
It’s tragically ironic that with all of the explosive and extreme high temperatures that the shuttle must deal with on take-off and re-entry, both accidents to date have been initiated by COLD temperatures and inadequate attempts to deal with them.
Here is hoping that Endeavor returns her crew safely back to Earth — I am sure she will, and that she has persevered with greater wounds in the past. Still, I am glad they are proactively checking and addressing any scars that need attention.
Godspeed, Endeavor crew.
August 11th, 2007 at 5:09 am
[…] am hearing about a three inch gash in the heat shield on Shuttle Endeavour. Phil from Bad Astronomy has a good post on it, with a picture. We should be hearing more from NASA about it […]
August 11th, 2007 at 9:57 pm
Maybe having a schoolteacher on board is the kiss of death … ;-~
Mind you I really hope NOT! Hoping ‘Endeavour ‘ gets back fine -at least we know about the problem & take steps to correct it.
Perhaps the best idea is having the external tank below the orbiter as was one of the original plans?
August 12th, 2007 at 9:47 am
Ironically, NASA’s [i]bragging[/i] that the new Constellation system puts the humans above and away from the SRB o-rings, and that it has no main tank to shed foam chunks.
Yipee, they’ve fixed the problems that they caused in the first place! Now all we have to worry about is the hundreds of dangers inherent in space flight, not the “own goals” that the Shuttle designers scored.
August 12th, 2007 at 10:48 pm
Thank God it isn’t serious. (t least it looks like a minor blemish to me)
If it needs to be fixed I am sure they have the neccesary astro goop to fill a 3 inch divot.
No worrys right?
August 13th, 2007 at 8:31 am
[…] over at Bad Astronomy has an excellent photo of the damage. (I’m too lazy to go searching for any […]
August 13th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
[…] of the Shuttle, NASA is pondering what to do about the 3-inch gouge in a tile on the Shuttle’s belly; replace it in-flight (hard, time-consuming, never been done before) or leave it be and, […]
August 13th, 2007 at 3:32 pm
NASA obviously doesn’t know about the Handyman’s Secret Weapon (thank you, Red Green) - Duct Tape!
August 16th, 2007 at 11:42 am
I have seen a Tile, and if the damage is not too deep, the tile should be fine. they might out a filler in there, but that is just to protect it before re-entry. That and the coating of the other tiles will burn off then anyway.
They want the gash not to be too deep, so they don’t have to replace a tile, It would be Very Hard to replace a tile in space. because the tolerance between tiles is so critical. you don’t want to replace a tile with one that would leek even more than the one you are replacing.