Author Topic: Space Shuttle and Easter Island  (Read 7029 times)

Offline bbb_rocket

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Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« on: 11/09/2017 01:27 am »
If the Challenger accident did not occur, NASA was planning on launching shuttles from Vandenberg AFB. In case of a Transoceanic Abort, the shuttle could land at Easter Island (the runway was extended to accommodate the shuttle). If an abort actually occurred and the shuttle arrived safely to Easter Island, what was the plan to get it back to the U.S. mainland?

The shuttle carrier craft only has a 1000 mile range, and Santiago Chili is 2335 miles away, and Hao French Polynesia is 1617 miles away in the wrong direction. I would imagine the need of sending a barge to pick up the shuttle, but Easter Island is not known for having an elaborate harbor.

It sounds like a logistical nightmare bringing that shuttle back. I for one would one would have nominated a permanent shuttle museum in the most unlikely of locations among the stone heads of Easter Island.

So what was the shuttle recovery plan? 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?

Offline kkattula

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #1 on: 11/09/2017 01:30 am »
Mid-air refueling via Air Force tanker?

Offline eric z

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #2 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. 8)

Offline bbb_rocket

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #3 on: 11/09/2017 01:37 am »
Mid-air refueling via Air Force tanker?


The shuttle was not capable of mid air refueling. Apparently it was planned but cancelled.

Offline kkattula

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #4 on: 11/09/2017 01:51 am »
Mid-air refueling via Air Force tanker?


The shuttle was not capable of mid air refueling. Apparently it was planned but cancelled.

Yeah, I just read that. But sounds like the kit fitted to the E-4 could've been used if necessary.

Another option might have been to remove parts to lighten the load and extend the range.  At a guess, removing the engines and fitting a drag-reducing duck-tail as used on early Enterprise would've helped a lot.

Offline MarsMethanogen

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #5 on: 11/09/2017 08:19 pm »
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. 8)
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.

Offline whitelancer64

Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #6 on: 11/09/2017 09:35 pm »
Lonely Easter Island Will Be Emergency Shuttle Landing Site
June 30, 1985|ANTHONY BOADLE | United Press International

"Vandenberg launches, planned at four a year, require an emergency landing site in the South Pacific in case of an engine failure, and Easter Island is ideally positioned.

U.S. Embassy officials in Santiago said the NASA project involves lengthening the runway at Mataveri, the island's airport, by 1,420 feet to the 11,055 feet required for a shuttle landing and its eventual piggy-back retrieval by a Boeing 747."

http://articles.latimes.com/1985-06-30/news/mn-70_1_easter-island

Emphasis mine. They'd have to do mid-air refueling, and it does seem NASA did some work towards doing that.

Per Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuttle_Carrier_Aircraft#Design_and_development

"Studies were conducted to equip the SCA with aerial refueling equipment, a modification already made to the U.S. Air Force E-4 (modified 747-200s) and 747 tanker transports for the IIAF. However, during formation flying with a tanker aircraft to test refueling approaches, minor cracks were spotted on the tailfin of N905NA. While these were not likely to have been caused by the test flights, it was felt that there was no sense taking unnecessary risks. Since there was no urgent need to provide an aerial refueling capacity, the tests were suspended."

However, there are no sources cited.

But I did find this:

From: https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/SCA_Historical_Narrative.pdf

"In early 1984, DFRC conducted a series of inflight refueling tests to evaluate the process for application to the SCA. Two tankers, a KC-135 and a KC-10, handled the refueling of the SCA. Center personnel mounted the Enterprise atop NASA 905 in the mate-demate device (MDD) for six of the nine test flights. Both the Enterprise and SCA were instrumented with pressure sensors and accelerometers to evaluate structural effects of the refueling."32

32 “Inflight Refueling Tests for Shuttle Ferry Flights,” X-Press, February 3, 1984, 3-4.

However, I can't find the actual document "Inflight Refueling Tests for Shuttle Ferry Flights".
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Offline Zed_Noir

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #7 on: 11/10/2017 12:11 pm »
Read somewhere that a probe & drogue refueling method was considered for 747 STS carrier aircraft. IIRC a fixed nose refuel probe from the A6 Intruder.

Offline rayleighscatter

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #8 on: 11/10/2017 12:31 pm »
When it came down to it, the emergency landing sites were primarily intended for the crew. There were several runways for KSC launches that were designated for aborts that weren't long enough for the SCA/Shuttle combo to take off from.

Offline Archibald

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #9 on: 11/21/2017 07:08 am »
The VC-25 AF1 can be aerial refueled. And I think the Iranians did modify some of their old 747s as tankers or to be air refueled.
What I mean is, it could have been done. And it would have been quite a sight: a 747 with an orbiter on its back trailing a KC-10... wow.
« Last Edit: 11/21/2017 07:09 am by Archibald »
Han shot first and Gwynne Shotwell !

Offline Jim

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #10 on: 11/21/2017 01:48 pm »
For orbiter recovery from a TPL, the payload, crew module contents and SSMEs would be removed to lighten the orbiter, so as to increase the ferry range.


Reverse refueling was looked at for the SCA.

Offline Jim

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #11 on: 11/21/2017 01:50 pm »
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?

Depends on the intended orbit and payload mass.

Offline Jim

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #12 on: 11/21/2017 01:54 pm »
Originally there was TAL, Trans Atlantic Landing for east coast launches.  For VAFB, the equivalent was  TPL, Trans Pacific Landing.  Later, TAL was changed to Trans oceanic Abort Landing to cover both sites.


When the shuttle program added TAL to the abort scenarios, there had to be the equivalent for VAFB and hence the search for useable islands.

Offline Michael Cassutt

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #13 on: 11/21/2017 02:39 pm »
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. 8)
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.

G. Harry Stine, not Stein, was the author's real name, used for his non-fiction. "Lee Correy" was the pen name, used for fiction going back to the 1950s. The ANALOG serial of "Shuttle Down" was as "Correy". 

Stine worked at White Sands in the 1950s, where an early book on artificial earth satellites got him in trouble with his employer at the time. He played a leading role in the development of model rocketry, publishing a handbook that went through multiple editions, while continuing to write non-fiction and fiction into the 1990s.

Michael Cassutt
« Last Edit: 11/21/2017 02:39 pm by Michael Cassutt »

Offline laszlo

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #14 on: 11/21/2017 03:33 pm »
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.


Offline Michael Cassutt

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #15 on: 11/21/2017 05:20 pm »
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.



There was no need for Stine to "cop" to the Lee Correy pseudonym -- it was an open pen name from 1960 or so on.  And while I respect Stine's work, he did tend to lean toward the "NASA bad" school.... I never heard any contemporaneous public criticism of SHUTTLE DOWN, though it's possible Stine got some private pushback.

MC

Offline Hog

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Re: Space Shuttle and Easter Island
« Reply #16 on: 11/21/2017 06:09 pm »
Jim talks about "reverse aerial refueling".  The KC-135 actually had this capability where instead of off loading fuel through its boom, there is an emergency procedure to actually on-load fuel through the boom system. Not all aircraft have the ability to offload their fuel(or reverse refuel) back onto the KC-135.

There are some Boeing 747 variants that have aerial refueling capability
The two VC-25s which become "AirForce One" when POTUS(President Of The United States) or "AirForce Two" when the Vice President of the United States is aboard, both have in flight aerial refueling capability. The VC-25 is a military version of the Boeing 747. Each VC-25 cost US$325 million. The Air Force reported that the operating cost for each VC-25A is $210,877 per hour.

The Boeing E-4 which is a military version of the Boeing 747-200B also has in flight refueling capability as part of the National Emergency Airborne Command Post (NEACP) program.  Whenever POTUS leaves US airspace aboard a VC-25, a second aircraft possibly an E4 will follow at a distance and land at a different airport than the VC-25. This allows backup capability in case the primary aircraft cannot take off due to failures or possible local hostilities at the primary airport.  It takes two fully loaded KC-135 tankers to fully refuel an E4-B.  There were 3 E4-As and one E4-Bs built, all the E4-As were later converted to the E4-B spec. In 1998 dollars they cost US$223 million. The E-4 costs nearly $160,000 per hour for the Air Force to operate

A bit more on the weight reduction for ferry flights using the SCA from TAL sites for KSC launches.
"The ferry weight from contingency landing sites in Europe and Africa is constrained to approx. 192,000 Ibs. (approx. 87,000 kg). The ferry weight from the Pacific contingency landing sites is further constrained to 154,000 Ibs. (approx. 70,000 kg).(STS Cargo and Abort and Recovery Operations)

This requires not only removal of the payload but removal of Orbiter main engines, tires, landing gear and other components as well. In addition, the Orbiter Z axis (vertical) and X axis (longitudinal) center of gravity location must be within a limited envelope."


Lightening the orbiter at the TAL site before ferrying to KSC

Weight limits of the SCA:
•Basic weight, NASA 905, 318,053 lbs (144,269 kg), NASA 911, 323,034 lbs (146,528 kg)
•Maximum gross brake release weight, 710,000 lbs (322,056 kg)
•Maximum gross landing weight, 600,000 lbs (272,160 kg).

Shuttle Carrier Aircraft effects of Loaded/Unloaded Operations
"Flying with the additional drag and weight of the Orbiter imposed significant fuel and altitude penalties. The range was reduced to 1,000 nautical miles (1,850 km), compared to an unladen range of 5500 nautical miles (10,100 km), requiring an SCA to stop several times to refuel on a transcontinental flight. Without the Orbiter, the SCA needed to carry ballast to balance out its center of gravity. The SCA had an altitude ceiling of 15,000 feet and a maximum cruise speed of Mach 0.6 with the orbiter attached."(Wiki)


Pic #1 Typical Mate-Demate Device (MDD)at KSC
Pic #2 Mobile MDD, last used for the Discovery-Enterprise swap, this would be flown in and local cranes used to hoist the orbiter onto the SCA
Pic #3 STS Microwave landing system that would be flown in to TAL sites before launch
Pic#4 "Mate Demate Device" Vandenberg aka Orbiter Lifting Fixture
Pic #5 SCA #905 (foreground) and SCA #911(background)



HISTORIC AMERICAN ENGINEERING RECORD SPACE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM, SHUTTLE CARRIER AIRCRAFT (as of August 2013) Great pics an lots of info-PDF format)
https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/SCA_Historical_Narrative.pdf
Paul

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