Discovery Took Off Today

[dysfunction]

The Space shuttle Discovery has made a succesful launch and is now in space.
Its good to see they have resumed space flight again.

Aparantly when it dumped its empty fuel tanks something else fell of as well.
I hope its nothing serious and they all return home in 12 days time in one piece.


http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/space/07/26/space.shuttle/index.html

I find it amazing that Discovery accelerated to more than 17,000 mph and will then dock with the international space station.

 

[Draylor]

Cant help being impressed by watching live pictures from a camera on the side of the fuel tanks. I suppose we can forgive a little interference when its from 60-odd miles above the ground, travelling at 15,000 mph

Hopefully the story about the falling debris is nothing serious: if theres problems with this shuttle mission I wouldnt like to bet on there being another.

 

[Tom]

Its easy to get blase about such things, but it really is an astonishing feat for something so massive to get so high, so quickly, and so professionally.

The cameras following it from the ground must have absolutely gigantic lenses and motion stability systems. 9 miles up, and its still quite large in frame. Amazing.

 

[Embattle]

I'm always impressed with the Shuttle, I remember seeing Jeremy Clarkson talking about the Shuttle which included footage of the Solid Rocket Boosters bending just before release. Although the massive amount of power is needed just to get its fat ass off the ground, it being so heavy because of all that fuel it needs to carry....bit of a vicious circle.

 

[dysfunction]

It is indeed a great sight to see this ship rocket out of the earths atmosphere. Its a great achievement.

One scary stat was if planes had the same safety record as these space ships there would be 500 odd plane crashes a day...

 

[JingleBells]

When you watch and read about these rockets its amazing, in under 70 years man had gone from not being able to fly, to being able to land on the moon.

I'd personally love to see man back on the moon, and hopefully land on mars, I think it would be one of those lifetime defining moments, my parents can always remember watching man land on the moon. In some ways, re-investing in the space program is a good thing Bush has done.

 

[Scouse]

I find it amazing that Discovery accelerated to more than 17,000 mph and will then dock with the international space station.

I've always loved any space-type-shit but if you watch the video of the launch here* you'll see them say it only gets to about 4000mph...

...I know it's still accelerating but 17k?

I always thought it was like 32,000mph but according to this it's not actually that fast.

Anyone?


*you need to click on the "watch the launch" linky for some realplayer action :-|

 

[dysfunction]

I've always loved any space-type-shit but if you watch the video of the launch here* you'll see them say it only gets to about 4000mph...

...I know it's still accelerating but 17k?

Thats what cnn said:

From CNN website:
During its first eight minutes aloft, Discovery accelerated to more than 17,000 mph in its journey

And from the Nasa website:

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/basics/ssme/index.html

 

[Tom]

I suppose it depends on what you're comparing its velocity to.

 

[dysfunction]

I always thought velocity of an object was measured against a still one

 

[JingleBells]

It has to travel at 11,200 metres/sec to escape the earths gravity (Escape Velocity), thats 11.2KM/second which is 672KM/minute or 40320KM/H. 1 KM = 1.609344 Miles, so thats 25,053MPH

 

[Tom]

I always thought velocity of an object was measured against a still one

Thats correct, but are they talking about its vertical velocity, or its angular velocity (if thats the right term?)

What I mean is, if something in geostationary orbit is fixed over the same spot on the planet, an observer underneath might say that its not moving at all, when in reality its moving in a circle around the earth at a fair old distance, and perhaps its real velocity should be measured from that perspective?

Glad I didn't like maths tbh.

 

[Danya]

It has to travel at 11,200 metres/sec to escape the earths gravity (Escape Velocity), thats 11.2KM/second which is 672KM/minute or 40320KM/H. 1 KM = 1.609344 Miles, so thats 25,053MPH

Well it doesn't have to hit escape velocity to escape gravity as the thrust from the engines counters some of the gravitational pull.

 

[old.Tohtori]

Don't think it's that fantastic to be honest. Strap tons of fuel on an iddybiddy shuttle just so we get off this planet and into the orbit. It's sluggish, burns gas like a motherf*cker and all in all looks clmbsy as hell.

Nice that we can, but i'm not impressed that much.

 

[TdC]

I have to agree with Tohtori here. I admire the effort, and the goal, but I personally think the method has become a little clunky over the years tbh.

 

[Jupitus]

See how high it got before that little spam leaflet about the local gym blew out from under the windscreen wiper?

 

[Embattle]

I have to agree with Tohtori here. I admire the effort, and the goal, but I personally think the method has become a little clunky over the years tbh.

It has been for years but until space elevators and other ideas become reality it'll still be one of the few ways to get people and cargo to and from space.....even if it does burn through an Olympic sized swimming pool amount of fuel every minute

 

[gmloki]

I really think it is a fantastic feat. Look what we have achieved in the blink of an eye in the relative history of the human race. Who knows, with all the crap going on on this planet, colonisation of another world might be our only saviour. We have to start somewhere

 

[Embattle]

Sooner or later the human race will have no choice but to more to a new world.

 

[Fana]

Space veichles will be that clunky until we start to build them where they belong: in space I believe thats the next step.

 

[gmloki]

You still have to get the "Clunk" Into space in the first place though

 

[xane]

Thats what cnn said:

You can always trust CNN for accuracy, look at coverage of the last Shuttle launch.

 

[babs]

If you ask me space vehicles will get MORE clunky (and chunky) once they're built in space. With no atmosphere to contend with what's the point in aerodynamics?

 

[Athan]

It has to travel at 11,200 metres/sec to escape the earths gravity (Escape Velocity), thats 11.2KM/second which is 672KM/minute or 40320KM/H. 1 KM = 1.609344 Miles, so thats 25,053MPH

Well it doesn't have to hit escape velocity to escape gravity as the thrust from the engines counters some of the gravitational pull.

Er, well, that and if it HAD reached Escape Velocity it wouldn't be in orbit around the Earth any more. It'd be off on an inter-planetary trip. (Maybe JingleBells meant to be saying this was the upper limit of orbital velocity ...).

From Space Shuttle simulators I do recall something arouind the 11K mph mark though.

Anyhows, well done NASA, and cross-fingers for a safe return home at mission end.

-Ath, who always gets a little choked up over things like this

 

[Cyradix]

I have to agree with Tohtori here. I admire the effort, and the goal, but I personally think the method has become a little clunky over the years tbh.

You watch too many SF series. You got used to all the high tech space flight methods they use on tv.

They might be able to replace the old space shuttle strapped to huge rockets idea if the space program budget multiplied by a 100 or so....

 

[Embattle]

Orbital speeds.

 

[DaGaffer]

It has been for years but until space elevators and other ideas become reality it'll still be one of the few ways to get people and cargo to and from space.....even if it does burn through an Olympic sized swimming pool amount of fuel every minute

Nah, there are more...elegant...ways to get into orbit, but as long as NASA anf other ngos like ESA are in control we'll never move on from WWII Von Braun technology; too many vested interests. NASA was great for a politically-motivated, money-no-object crash programme to get to the moon, but could you imagine what the world would be like if the only way you could build a plane or a car (or a computer) was through a government-run department?

 

[Chilly]

Escape velocity is the velocity required for a particle to escape the earth's gravitational pull assuming it gains this velocity instantainiously (obviously impossible but lets ignore that for the sake of discussion). You could gt into orbit while going at 2mph - but it would cost you a FUCK load of energy - I imagine it's more efficient to get a bit of speed up (300-400mph?) while going vertically to get into orbit where you knock about at around 12,000 mph iirc.

/edit
also JB, your maths is horrible!!!! 1km != 1.6 miles! its the other way round, mile > km, after all.

 

[dysfunction]

You can always trust CNN for accuracy, look at coverage of the last Shuttle launch.

heh...thats why I backed it up with a link to a nasa page!

 

[JingleBells]

also JB, your maths is horrible!!!! 1km != 1.6 miles! its the other way round, mile > km, after all.

The maths is correct, explanation is just wrong, as for getting escape velocity stuff mixed up, this is why I didn't do physics after a-level