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Author
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Topic: Can the shuttle land without its commander?
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ASCAN1984
Member Posts: 1050
From: County Down, Nothern Ireland
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 08-02-2008 04:20 PM
   
Is there a scenario in place for if the space shuttle commander is incapacitated in orbit and in whatever way and cannot land the orbiter thus leaving it to the pilot and if so is it practiced? |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 49407
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 08-02-2008 04:31 PM
The pilot practices approach and landing procedures in the shuttle training aircraft, a modified Gulfstream II, just as the commander does. In fact, prior to a mission, both the commander and pilot will have completed 1,000 STA landings. If both commander and pilot are incapacitated, the ground can take control and land the vehicle with the installation of the Remote Control Orbiter in-flight maintenance (IFM) cable. |
webhamster
Member Posts: 106
From: Ottawa, Canada
Registered: Jul 2008
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posted 08-04-2008 11:58 PM
And now place yourself in the position of a mission specialist in that situation. How would you feel? Personally, I'd be really, really nervous! |
Greggy_D
Member Posts: 1007
From: Michigan
Registered: Jul 2006
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posted 08-09-2008 08:11 AM
Does NASA still train some mission specialists to land the shuttle. I seem to remember that Shannon Lucid was certified at one time to land the shuttle. I could be way off on this though. |
OV-105
Member Posts: 891
From: Ridgecrest, CA
Registered: Sep 2000
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posted 08-09-2008 06:18 PM
I think that some mission specialists on some of the later Spacelab flights were trained for on orbit burns and for flight systems. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 49407
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 08-29-2008 08:35 PM
Former space shuttle program manager Wayne Hale writes on his blog about the auto-landing capability of the shuttle: Early on, the shuttle was supposed to have jet engines so, among other reasons, it could fly multiple approaches or divert to different runways. However, the weight of the orbiter in the design phase kept growing, from 150,000 pounds empty to 200,000 pounds and more. And the ops guys kept asking (as they always do) "what if the engines don't start during entry, don't we have to protect against that situation?" So fairly early on, the jet engines, the fuel tanks, and all that stuff got deleted from the design. So the orbiter is the world's heaviest and only hypersonic glider. One shot at landing is all the commander gets. The auto landing capability that was built into the shuttle is not perfect. It could work, if necessary, but engineering analysis shows that there are more times than we would like where the auto landing system would fail. On a commercial jetliner, this is accommodated by an auto go-around feature. But then the shuttle... well, see the paragraph above. |
carmelo
Member Posts: 1096
From: Messina, Sicilia, Italia
Registered: Jun 2004
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posted 09-29-2022 05:54 AM
In a contingency case, all the member of a space shuttle crew, so mission specialists and payload specialists, were able and qualified to pilot the orbiter (for reentry or others maneuvers)? Editor's note: Threads merged. |
sts205cdr
Member Posts: 735
From: Sacramento, CA
Registered: Jun 2001
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posted 09-29-2022 12:54 PM
I was the pilot and we had just performed our de-orbit burn when the commander, an elderly woman, casually said "I can't land." The Camp SIMSUPs couldn't electronically switch the controls, so we had to quickly switch seats. Fun sim! |
pokey
Member Posts: 368
From: Houston, TX, USA
Registered: Aug 2000
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posted 11-10-2022 08:08 PM
The shuttle pilots were more than qualified to land the space shuttle. I worked on the JSC Shuttle Mission Simulator and was able to land the space shuttle without formal astronaut training. Late in the program an uplink capability to arm and down the landing gear was added, so MCC could remotely land the shuttle. Another addition that started with STS-95 was supplementing autoland with GPS. One string was added first then three once the feasibility of GPS was agreed upon.I may still have Covid brains, but this is what I recall from more than a decade of not working shuttle. Thanks for reading. |
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