Mid-air refueling via Air Force tanker?
Quote from: kkattula on 11/09/2017 01:30 amMid-air refueling via Air Force tanker?The shuttle was not capable of mid air refueling. Apparently it was planned but cancelled.
There is a really cool novel called "Shuttle Down" by Lee Correy still available in paperback [remember those?] from Amazon at reasonable prices. They got to land on Easter Island- a fun evening's read! Some of the logistical problems created are explored in detail, along with some foreign intrigue... Any shuttle-fan will have fun reading it.
Auxiliary question, STS-51-f had the only engine failure on a shuttle mission, if that launch had occurred on a polar orbit from Vandenberg, would it have make it to orbit or would Easter Island have been a possible abort location?
Quote from: eric z on 11/09/2017 01:35 am There is a really cool novel called "Shuttle Down" by Lee Correy still available in paperback [remember those?] from Amazon at reasonable prices. They got to land on Easter Island- a fun evening's read! Some of the logistical problems created are explored in detail, along with some foreign intrigue... Any shuttle-fan will have fun reading it. Yes, I read that when it was first serialized in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact monthly science fiction magazine, but under his pseudonym, G. Harry Stein.
Stine wrote a piece for Analog wherein he copped to being Lee Corey and having written that story. He also claimed that the resulting brouhaha at NASA justified his use of the pseudonym. According to Stine, it had never occurred to NASA that a Shuttle could end up on Isla de Pasqua (Rapa Nui to the earliest immigrants/colonizers). He made that the linchpin of his story. According to him, NASA was offended, went into denial and attacked the story as inaccurate. Then as the technical details were shown to be true, they attacked it as a classified data leak. Then when it was shown that the data came from publicly accessible sources such as Jeppson charts, NASA finally accepted it and began the process of planning for the possibility. This is all according to Stine, I have never seen any independent confirmation.I really loved Stone's writing on model rocketry (still have my copy of his book from the 1970's), but his forte was truly technical writing, not fiction. His characters were 2D, the dialogue was tedious, the plot devices contrived and replete with stereotypes. But the technical details were spot on.