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#640
by
el_nino
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:01
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Confirmed lightning strike at the pad, which requires data reviews by all affected systems - engineering. Already in work
Ouch. How long does this usually take? Is this a potential showstopper for tomorrow's attempt?
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#641
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:02
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It would be a showstopper if they find damage to the shuttle. I don't know that there is a set timeline.
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#642
by
MadameConcorde
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:03
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From up here on the 10th floor at the MCO airport hotel where I am staying I see a dark black sky in the distance toward KsC and the coast.
I even wonder if they will maintain the flights.
With the news of the lightning hitting the launch pad I don't see Atlantis lifting off in the next 24 hours.
Doubt they will be taking us to KSC and the Causeway tonight.
Patience... mother of all virtues....
:-(
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#643
by
Chris Bergin
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:03
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Confirmed lightning strike at the pad, which requires data reviews by all affected systems - engineering. Already in work
Ouch. How long does this usually take? Is this a potential showstopper for tomorrow's attempt?
If a system was affected, for sure. If no systems were affected, and they'll know "today", then should be ok.
A lot of it is just precaution. The stack is very well protected.
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#644
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:05
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RSS walkdown complete, no discrepancies.
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#645
by
shuttlefanatic
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:06
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How would this situation be different from STS-127 (July 11th attempt -
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=17777.15)? It looks like in that case the lightning strike wasn't really brought up until the tanking MMT.
Edit - more or less answered my own question with further reading - they took 11 hits within 0.3nm, including one that put overvoltage into a couple of the buses. Leaving this post as the above link has some MMT press conference coverage that discusses a bit about their lightning test procedures. It's a short thread; presser is on page 4.
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#646
by
el_nino
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:09
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If a system was affected, for sure. If no systems were affected, and they'll know "today", then should be ok.
A lot of it is just precaution. The stack is very well protected.
Right. Sorry, what I meant was...do we know how long it generally takes to check everything at the pad after a lightning strike? Assuming no damage, does the actual process of checking take up too much time to be able to proceed normally with things, which could nullify a launch attempt tomorrow?
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#647
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:12
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Good memory fanatic! Ford's recap sort of explains what potential differences... On the good side, this is just one strike versus 11. On the potential bad side, this was much stronger.
===
Not the press conference I wanted to be having today. Did not give the team a go to tank, needed more data on the lightning strikes. If you were here in the cape, had a pretty nice electrical storm. Took eleven strikes within the .3 NM of the pad. If a strike comes into the .3 NM radius, kicks off a formal review of the strike, determine if the strike was big enough to declare a lightning event, then we go from there. Just because we had strikes in the .3 NM, doesn't mean it was a formal event. Of the 11 strikes, 7 hit the CWS (Lightning mast, Water Tower, wires) CWLIS was triggered 7 times, so we know we took 7 hits. That's fine, the system is there for a reason. With a lightning event, you have the initial peak of electricity, then you have the electric field that spreads.. We can monitor actual power voltages on the vehicle systems.. and we've had some voltages over the threshold. This does NOT mean we have damage on the vehicle, we just have to check on it. Had two strikes that triggered buses to hit 110v, 100v is the limit. Teams now need to go off and see if retest is needed. ET is fine, SSMEs were powered up, that's fine, payload just needs to check with JAXA, but we should be fine there. Two areas where we wanted to check were the Orbiter and the SRBs, SRBs have the pyros to eject from the tank.. we can't check the pyros, we don't want to separate the SRBs while we are on the ground (heh). Could have gone a few hours and let the teams work on tanking, but we wanted to let them go off and make sure everything is okay before we launch. Teams recommended it, we just concurred with it.
We have seen NOTHING so far that anything has been affected by the lightning strikes. If we went by the book, and just looked at every circuit, we were looking at 2 weeks to the next attempt. Just want to make sure, again, to check a few systems. We were perfectly happy with the plan to let them work.
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#648
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:26
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Preliminary good news - the Catenary Wire Lightning Instrumentation System (CWLIS) bulbs did not trigger which would indicate no direct hit. L2 has more on that system.
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#649
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:27
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#650
by
MadameConcorde
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:30
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#651
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:31
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We are now getting heavy rain along with lightning and thunder here at MCO.
You are west of KSC and the activity is moving northwest, so will have no impact on the launch or operations.
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#652
by
racshot65
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:32
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#653
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:35
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Base Ops says first motion is on hold. There is trouble on the weather circuit between KSC and MOC(?) so no motion until that's repaired.
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#654
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:38
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Sounds like that might have cleared up. Electricians and other groups ready for lightning walkdown after RSS.
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#655
by
Mapperuo
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:39
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#656
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:41
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I'll hazard a guess and say they wouldn't do RSS rollback if they knew the S0018 would take too long for a launch tomorrow?
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#657
by
Mapperuo
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:44
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I'll hazard a guess and say they wouldn't do RSS rollback if they knew the S0018 would take too long for a launch tomorrow?
Duh, Thanks.
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#658
by
rdale
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:45
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Ugh... new storm popping up near the AFB and moving towards the pad. No lightning yet but the port is back under a Phase II warning.
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#659
by
darren1
on 07 Jul, 2011 18:45
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Getting REALLY dark at the cape on NASA TV. Personally would prefer a 1 day scrub (If it's possible?
?) Saturday is a much better day to watch the lauch without having to worry about work finding out I've bunked off!
?) Saturday is a much better day to watch the lauch without having to worry about work finding out I've bunked off!