It was 35 years ago today...

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Fnord
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28 Jan 2021, 9:28 am

On January 28, 1986, the Space Shuttle Challenger blew up on its 10th mission 73 seconds after launch, killing all those aboard:

• Michael J. Smith
• Dick Scobee
• Ronald McNair
• Ellison Onizuka
• Christa McAuliffe
• Gregory Jarvis
• Judith Resnik

A Presidential Commission determined that the incident was due to a failure of rubber O-rings made by Morton-Thiokol that provided a pressure seal in the aft field joint of the shuttle's right Solid Rocket Booster. The failure of the O-rings was attributed to a design flaw, as their performance could be too easily compromised by factors that included the low temperature on the day of launch. The Commission found that O-ring resiliency is directly related to temperature and due to the low temperature at launch -- 36 degrees Fahrenheit, or 15 degrees lower than the next coldest previous launch -- the O-rings had not provided a proper seal.

:cry: No jokes, please; they are all offensive.

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kitesandtrainsandcats
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28 Jan 2021, 12:42 pm

Are some good histories of the Shuttle by author Dennis Jenkins; they nicely cover the accident and the aftermath. It was a sad thing all the way around.

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Fnord
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28 Jan 2021, 12:45 pm

While technically an "accident", it was also "murder by deliberate negligence" seven times over.

JP210168
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28 Jan 2021, 12:48 pm

Yeah, I had heard about this. Christa McAuliffe...that name rang a bell. A quick search on Wikipedia shows she was set to be the first teacher to head to space. Sadly, because of this tragic incident that never came to be.

magz
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28 Jan 2021, 12:54 pm

The first thing that came to my mind when I thought "1986" was Chernobyl... but we'll need to wait until Spring for its anniversary.
It wasn't a happy year.

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NaturalEntity
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28 Jan 2021, 2:03 pm

That's sad

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Sylkat
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28 Jan 2021, 2:20 pm

I remember.
It is one of those events that are so awful that it feels like it could not be real.

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kitesandtrainsandcats
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28 Jan 2021, 4:16 pm

Fnord wrote:

While technically an "accident", it was also "murder by deliberate negligence" seven times over.

Pretty muchly.

Here's a bit from the NYT from back then, https://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/22/us/n ... loded.html

Quote:

John E. Pike, director of space policy at the Federation of American Scientists, called the situation at NASA ''shocking.''

''They were clearly covering up the magnitude of the problem,'' Mr. Pike said. ''It raises the question of who knew what when. It's one thing to say this was a dinky little problem that a few engineers worried about, and another to embark on a major redesign of the system.''

The fact that the space agency applied the ''solution'' as early as 1982 and again in 1985 could affect litigation over the Challenger disaster, according to a lawyer representing Cheryl McNair, widow of Dr. Ronald E. McNair, one of the Challenger astronauts.

''Why fix the booster if it wasn't broken?'' asked Ronald D. Krist, a Houston lawyer who has filed suit in Texas in behalf of Mrs. McNair.

''It makes the fact that they forced this launch all the more reprehensible,'' Mr. Krist said. ''It shows a conscious indifference to the welfare and safety of the astronauts. Rather than postpone a launch, they pressed ahead.''

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kitesandtrainsandcats
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28 Jan 2021, 4:20 pm

And this, too; https://history.nasa.gov/rogersrep/v1ch6.htm

Quote:

Report of the PRESIDENTIAL COMMISSION on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident
Chapter VI: An Accident Rooted in History.
...
Design Objections

Reaction from Marshall to the early Solid Rocket Motor test results was rapid and totally opposite of Thiokol's. In a September 2, 1977 memorandum, Glenn Eudy, Marshall's Chief Engineer of the Solid Rocket Motor Division, informed Alex McCool, Director of the Structures and Propulsion Laboratory, that the assembly of a developmental motor provided early indications that the Thiokol design:

"Allowed O-ring clearance.... Some people believe this design deficiency must be corrected by some method such as shimming and perhaps design modification to the case joint for hardware which has not been final machined.... I personally believe that our first choice should be to correct the design in a way that eliminates the possibility of O-ring clearance.... Since this is a very critical SRM issue, it is requested that the assignment results be compiled in such a manner as to permit review at the S&E Director's level as well as project manager."

After seeing the data from the September 1977 hydroburst test, Marshall engineer Leon Ray submitted a report entitled "Solid Rocket Motor Joint Leakage Study" dated October 21, 1977. It characterizes "no change" in the Thiokol design as "unacceptable"-"tang can move outboard and cause excessive joint clearance resulting in seal leakage. Eccentric tang/clevis interface can cause O-ring extrusion when case is pressurized." Ray recommended a "redesign of the tang and reduce tolerance on the clevis" as the "best option for a long-term fix." 29

After Ray's 1977 report, John Q. Miller, chief of the Solid Rocket Motor branch at Marshall, signed and sent a memorandum on January 9, 1978 to his superior, Glenn Eudy, describing the problems evident in the Solid Rocket Motor joint seal. "We see no valid reason for not designing to accepted standards," the memo said, and it emphasized that proper sealing of the joint by use of shims to create necessary O-ring pressure was "mandatory to prevent hot gas leaks and resulting catastrophic failure."30

One year later, not having received a response to his 1978 memo, Miller signed and forwarded a second memo strenuously objecting to Thiokol's Solid Rocket Motor joint seal design. This memo, dated January 19, 1979, opened with: "We find the Thiokol position regarding design adequacy of the clevis joint to be completely unacceptable...." 31

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Fnord
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28 Jan 2021, 4:27 pm

No one claimed responsibility, and no one was brought to trial.

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28 Jan 2021, 7:45 pm

One of the few events that I remember exactly where I was and what I was doing when it happened. I was listening to it live on NPR and the shock and horror of the announcer’s voice. I was devastated.

I had thought Reagan reckless to put a teacher on board.

And I thought it reckless to try to launch at colder temps than ever before.

I did not like being proved right.

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28 Jan 2021, 7:54 pm

I was sitting an exam. We were interrupted by teachers crying.

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shlaifu
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28 Jan 2021, 9:28 pm

I've read Richard Feynman's account, who was member of the investigating commission. The problem of the O-rings being sensitive to outside temperature was known by the engineers, but the info didn't travel well through NASA.
Feynman concluded, NASA had become too large, hierarchical and bureaucratic

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QuantumChemist
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29 Jan 2021, 12:19 am

I watched it happen on live tv at home (sick with a cold). That is an event I wish I could forget, but never will.

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