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EHITCH

EHITCH

Pre-takeoff checklist
Joined
May 2, 2005
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237
Location
Chicago
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Display name:
Elizabeth
I'm old enough to remember John Glenn's first space flight, and watching the launches and landings never gets old for me.
God bless Eileen Collins and her crew, and hallelujah for their safe return to flight and return to earth.
Elizabeth
 
Yes, wasn't it exciting (and a relief) when they landed? I was in my car on my way to work, listened to the live coverage on CBS. I remember all those earlier flights, too.
 
I have been under a rock all morning (in a certain Soapbox area, specifically) and missed it. Any problems?

Jim G
 
grattonja said:
I have been under a rock all morning (in a certain Soapbox area, specifically) and missed it. Any problems?

Jim G
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Well, apart from the diversion to Edwards, everything else seemed to go fine, Eileen landed like she was flying a 152.

EH
 
EHITCH said:
Well, apart from the diversion to Edwards, everything else seemed to go fine, Eileen landed like she was flying a 152.

EH
Click to expand...

Sorry to dissapoint you, but Eileen never touches the controls. The thing lands itself.
 
Bu...Buu...Butt, Eileen was PIC ;) . Right?

Wonder what the insurance would be to be PIC in discovery if someone could fly it:dunno: . Wonder how many hours of dual would be required and how one would get it.:p

Dave
 
Anthony said:
Sorry to dissapoint you, but Eileen never touches the controls. The thing lands itself.
Click to expand...

Not quite. Once the shuttle is below the speed of sound, the commander takes over from the computer and lands the aircraft.
 
EHITCH said:
Not quite. Once the shuttle is below the speed of sound, the commander takes over from the computer and lands the aircraft.
Click to expand...

You are correct. I had heard it was basically "auto-land".

"At 25 miles above, the shuttle's computer give the control to the commander. The commander flies the shuttle around an imaginary cylinder to line the orbiter with the runway and drop the altitude. During final approach, the commander steepens the angle of descent to minus 20 degree.

When the shuttle is 610m above the ground, the commander pulls the nose to slow the rate of descent. The pilot deploys the landing gear and the shuttle touches down. The commander applies brakes and the speed brake on the vertical tail opens up. A parachute is deployed from the back to stop the shuttle. The parachute and speed brakes increase the drag and stops the shuttle about the midway to three quarters down the runway."

Thanks for the heads up!
 
Didn't John Young take control briefly at something like mach 25 and 350,000 ft during the very first flight to make sure it would be possible to land in the event of a failure of the autoland system?
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Bu...Buu...Butt, Eileen was PIC ;) .
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Yep and she gets to log it as 456 hours of cross country too since they landed at Edwards. :<)

Len
 
Len Lanetti said:
Yep and she gets to log it as 456 hours of cross country too since they landed at Edwards. :<)

Len
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456 hours to get from Florida to California? That thing can't be as fast as everyone keeps saying. :rofl:
 
Frank Browne said:
456 hours to get from Florida to California? That thing can't be as fast as everyone keeps saying. :rofl:
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And from the description of the flight it sounds like it is certainly easier to slow down than a Mooney. No way I could scrub off 6,000 knots in 15 minutes in the Mooney while descending at the same time.

Len
 
But... Do you get to log the landing (is it a landing) at the space station. If so, what "airport identifier" do you put in your log book? Would you put in your "route of flight"? What "type" would you log it as?

Lots of interesting logging questions there.

Jim G
 
grattonja said:
Do you get to log the landing (is it a landing) at the space station.
Click to expand...

Good question...both the station and the shuttle actually never stop moving. Maybe it is just a very long duration formation flight.

:<)

Len
 
According to the news this AM, the 747 ferry needs 6 fuel stops to get it back to FLA from Edwards. I'm glad they don't have my gas card!
 
Nice to see their landing technique has improved a bit since last time.

EHITCH said:
Scroll down for the sequence as the aircraft nears the ground, and for an interesting discussion of shuttle performance vs commercial aircraft.
Click to expand...

Numbers are cute but they don't really tell you anything useful about how the shuttle glides.

If you ever get a chance watch the Imax show "Blue Planet" (I think that's the name of the show I'm thinking of) preferably at one of the domed Imax theatres.
They had an Imax camera aimed out one of the front windows during landing. It started at something like FL180 with the runway at the bottom of the window. My initial reaction based on anything that could even vaguely glide including an airliner with the engines out and full flaps would have ended up well out into in the ocean from there. I was wrong. It touched down on the numbers on the proper end of the runway. I seriously thought it was going to end up in the approach lights...

The shuttle doesn't glide. It falls.


Interesting shuttle VSI trivia:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/shuttle/sts114/status.html
ENTRY INTERFACE.
The shuttle is flying with its nose elevated 40 degrees, wings level, at an altitude of 400,000 feet, passing over the southern Pacific Ocean, at a velocity of Mach 25, descending at a rate of over 600 feet per second.

Yep. Rock.
 
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