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Ares67
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« Reply #195 on: 02/26/2012 08:42 PM » |
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Ares67
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« Reply #196 on: 02/26/2012 08:43 PM » |
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Ares67
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« Reply #197 on: 02/26/2012 08:44 PM » |
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Ares67
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« Reply #198 on: 02/26/2012 08:46 PM » |
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Saturday, January 18, 1986 – Returning from an extended shortened flight
Again Florida was no-go early that morning, but Columbia finally had to come home. So after deorbit burn she flew into the darkness over the Pacific Ocean, coming in for Edwards Air Force Base and the second night landing of the Space Shuttle program.
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Ares67
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« Reply #199 on: 02/26/2012 08:51 PM » |
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“And finally, on our fifth attempted landing—so it was five attempts to launch, and then five attempts to land—in the middle of the night on January 18th, we landed at Edwards Air Force Base, which was interesting because with a daytime scheduled landing, you would have thought that we wouldn’t have been ready for that. And Hoot, in his infinite wisdom, had decided that half of our landing training was going to be nighttime, because you needed to be prepared for anything. And so we were as ready for a night landing as we could have been for anything.”
(61-C Pilot Charlie Bolden, “NASA Oral History Project”)
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Ares67
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« Reply #200 on: 02/26/2012 08:53 PM » |
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ORBITER EXPERIMENTS PROGRAM
Significant modifications have been made on orbiter Columbia in order to accommodate the following three research experiments developed by the Langley Research Center as part of the Orbiter Experiments Program. These experiments are designed to measure orbiter aerodynamic and aerothermodynamic characteristics during reentry.
Shuttle Infrared Leeside Temperature Sensing (SILTS) – The SILTS package will replace the fin tip atop the vertical tail and consists of a cylindrical housing approximately 20 inches in diameter and is capped at the leading edge by a spherical dome. Mounted inside the dome is an infrared camera which will obtain images of the upper (leeside) surfaces of Columbia’s port wing and fuselage during reentry. The images will provide detailed temperature maps at the surface of the leeside thermal protection materials and indicate the amount of aerodynamic heating of the surfaces in flight. SILTS will be activated by Columbia’s computer at about 400,000 ft. above Earth and will terminate after passing through the period of significant aerodynamic heating.
Shuttle Entry Air Data System (SEADS) – Housed in a completely new nose cap, SEADS will measure local surface air pressure through 14 penetration assemblies distributed about the nose cap’s surface. Each assembly contains a small hole through which oncoming air passes. This experiment will allow precise post-flight determination of the orbiter’s attitude relative to the oncoming airstream and the density of the atmosphere through which the vehicle has flown. SEADS will be activated at an altitude of about 56 miles through landing.
Shuttle Upper Atmosphere Mass Spectrometer (SUMS) – Located inside the nose wheel well, SUMS will sample air at Columbia’s surface through a small hole to measure the number of molecules of various gas species. This data, combined with vehicle motion information will allow determination of orbiter aerodynamic characteristics at altitudes where the atmosphere is extremely thin. SUMS was originally developed for the Viking spacecraft that landed on Mars in 1976 and has been modified to operate in the orbiter reentry flight atmosphere
(Source: STS 61-C Press Kit)
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Ares67
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« Reply #201 on: 02/26/2012 08:58 PM » |
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PAO: This is Mission Control Houston; it’s been ten minutes since entry interface. So we can expect another five to seven minutes of blackout before we regain communication with the ship. Some 25 technicians arrived at Edwards this morning from Kennedy Space Center to support the convoy operation at Edwards. And another 120 will arrive this afternoon to prepare the orbiter for the ferry operation, returning it to the Kennedy Space Center aboard the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. – The Flight Dynamics Officer just advises the Flight Director that we are probably seven minutes from exiting this extended blackout and that there are just a few moments of very quick bursts of data through the C-band. Hawaii has the orbiter in view through the ground station, but again the ionization building up around the craft prevents reliable communication and data transmission. We are approximately 19 minutes away from the predicted touchdown.
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Ares67
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« Reply #202 on: 02/26/2012 09:02 PM » |
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PAO: Velocity mach 2.4, sink rate now 179 feet per second, 50 miles from Edwards… velocity mach 1.8, altitude 71,000 feet, 40 miles from touchdown and five minutes…
CapCom (Fred Gregory): Columbia, Houston, surface winds are calm.
Gibson: Copy, Fred, calm surface winds.
PAO: And now approximately 35 miles from the runway at Edwards.
CapCom: Columbia, Houston, state vector transfer to the BFS, please.
Gibson: Okay, Charlie will be just doing that. Thank you, Fred.
PAO: All indications are that everything is going very smoothly on this entry… velocity mach 1.4, altitude 59,000 feet… Columbia now about 120 miles inland from the coast, sink rate about 300 feet per second now… mach 1.1 velocity…
CapCom: Columbia, Houston, Charlie.
Bolden: Go ahead there, Fred.
CapCom: Roger, we would like the water spray boiler for APU 1 power heater controller 1 to Bravo, and then bring up the water spray boiler.
Bolden: Okay, we’re bringing it to Bravo.
PAO: Velocity now right at mach one, 24 miles from the end of the runway… losing altitude at a rate of 300 feet per second, touchdown three and a half minutes away…
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Ares67
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« Reply #203 on: 02/26/2012 09:06 PM » |
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A very loud double sonic boom rolled over the Rogers dry lakebed, announcing Columbia was right there in the dark skies over the Mojave Desert – coming home from her extended shortened mission in space.
PAO: Ah, the sonic boom audible at Edwards… Columbia now 18 miles from the runway… now encountering the Heading Alignment Circle, making a 180 degree left turn… all mechanical systems onboard working very smoothly… Flight Dynamics says the ship is on the HAC and looks very good; energy is good… altitude 24,000 feet, velocity… 662 feet per second, 12 miles from the runway… Mission Commander “Hoot” Gibson now has flight control in manual mode and is very smoothly and very precisely guiding the ship around the Heading Alignment Circle… and FIDO says we look good rolling onto final… nine miles from touchdown, altitude 15,000 feet, sink rate 220 feet per second… Columbia now seven miles from touchdown, a minute and a half away… altitude 11,000 feet, seven miles from the end of the runway… and Columbia now on glide slope, six miles from touchdown…
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Ares67
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« Reply #204 on: 02/26/2012 09:12 PM » |
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CapCom: Columbia, Houston, we show you on glide slope, slightly right of centerline – correcting, surface winds are calm.
CapCom: Roger, copy, Fred. Thank you.
PAO: Our touchdown now about a minute away, altitude 6,800 feet, velocity 589 feet per second… four miles from touchdown... again the approach very smooth and right on the programmed path… two miles from touchdown, altitude 1,300 feet… now 300 feet altitude… ah, 3,000 feet from the end of the runway… sink rate now down to 20 feet per second…
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Ares67
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« Reply #205 on: 02/26/2012 09:22 PM » |
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At this moment Columbia swooped out of the darkness into the lights of the runway, about an hour and twelve minutes before sunrise at the U.S. west coast.
PAO: … and now on video… and we show touchdown after a Mission Elapsed Time of six days, two hours, four minutes and nine seconds… speed at touchdown roughly 195 knots… that rollout going very smooth, all onboard systems look very good. The entire approach and landing process was very nominal right up on our programmed flight path through virtually every instant of the approach.
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Ares67
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« Reply #206 on: 02/26/2012 09:25 PM » |
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« Reply #207 on: 02/26/2012 09:29 PM » |
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Gibson: Houston, Columbia, we’ve got wheels stop.
CapCom: Welcome back to Earth, you seasoned space veterans. We’re working on your deltas…
Gibson: Roger that, Houston, seasoned by an extra two days.
PAO: Our Mission Elapsed Time to touchdown once again is unofficially six days, two hours, four minutes…
CapCom: Columbia, Houston, post-landing per procedures – no deltas.
Gibson: Copy that, Fred.
PAO: … repeating the unofficial Mission Elapsed Time again – six days, two hours, four minutes, nine seconds… and the sense of relief here among the entry control team is probably very similar to what was experienced in the Launch Control Center six days ago, when Columbia was launched after four successive delays.
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Ares67
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« Reply #208 on: 02/26/2012 09:32 PM » |
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« Reply #209 on: 02/26/2012 09:40 PM » |
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PAO: The Columbia crew now leaving the ship… they are – in order – Mission Commander “Hoot” Gibson, Pilot Charles Bolden, Mission Specialists George Nelson, Steve Hawley and Franklin Chang-Diaz and Payload Specialists Bob Cenker and Congressman Bill Nelson… being greeted on the foot of the stairs by the senior NASA representative there, which is veteran astronaut Dan Brandenstein. Coincidently Brandenstein was the Capsule Communicator for the ascent of Columbia on STS-1, the first flight of the Space Shuttle. Now, several flights later, he gets to visit the ship, having made two spaceflights himself – one as Commander.
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