http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/5091308.stm
what egos.

Nasa is to launch the space shuttle Discovery on 1 July, despite warnings from senior safety officials and engineers that it is not safe to fly.

A meeting held to set the launch date was split on whether the problem of foam chunks breaking away - which brought down the Columbia - was fixed.

Safety officials said modifications carried out since the problem recurred a year ago were still not enough.
snip
The managers believe that even if more foam breaks off, the crew will be able to take refuge in the International Space Station rather than attempting to land a damaged craft.

more

Win/Win.

PB

I can't help myself.....................:rofl:

safe to fly....

Jesus!!!! BushCo, looking for his bounce. And screw those who might die in the effort!


Reuters news agency, citing officials, said Nasa's top safety official and lead engineer both opposed the flight.

But don't listen to them, they don't know what they're saying...they're only EXPERTS :sarcasm:

He was asked how it felt to be blasted into space. He replied he was relying upon an assembly comprised of approximately one million parts, every single one of which was made by the cheapest bidder.

So starting from the point of view that you have a thirty year old piece of technology of tremendous complexity which we now know is of a seriously flawed design, they are indeed tempting fate. They are extraordinarily courageous when other people's wellbeing is at stake, but they seem to be extremely cautious whenever any degree of personal risk might be involved. Undisclosed locations, anyone?

John Glenn who said that.:shrug:

I'll try to find out.

It's a very sobering feeling to be up in space and realize that one's safety factor was determined by the lowest bidder on a government contract.
Alan Shepard
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alanshepar179873.html

The first reference is a post flight news conference where John Glenn anwers a question about what it felt like sitting on the top of the Mercury Redstone. This is recorded as follows:

"People asked him that after the flight," Glenn noted. "And Shepard said: `I wasn’t scared, but I was up there looking around, and suddenly I realized I was sitting on top of a rocket built by the lowest bidder.’

So it was Shepard not Glenn, according to Glenn. Unfortunately this is got picked up wrongly in Tom Wolfe's /The/ /Right /Stuff/ as an original thought by Glenn and that is probably where the mistake comes from.
http://72.14.209.104/search?q=cache:UbEWKUlvQwEJ:binarybonsai.com/archives/2006/01/24/shuttle-a-deathtrap/feed/+%22lowest+bidder%22+mercury&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=5

Along with Edward White and Roger Chaffee

The Fumbling pReszint wants to create his own reality.

:-(

That's a painful but unfortunately realistic possibility.

about the Columbia disaster. It began just like this. Maybe Nasa needs to netflix that show, could save some lives.

Much like the Moon mission, which started with mercury, then Gemini, then Apollo, the first shuttles should have been retired after the first accident (or before then actually). A new design shuttle (now that we sort of know how to make one) should have been done at that time, if we had done that, by now we would have the "2001: A Space Odyssey" type service (though not with Pam Am logos). But we've stuck with the prototype, and only underfunded private ventures like Rutan's SpaceShip 1 are leading the way with new technology.

And if we weren't going to build a new design, we should have terminated the shuttle, never launched the space station, and spent our money on robotic planetary missions (plus a heck of a lot more EOS missions!!!).

Having personally known a member of the Columbia crew, we owe it to their memories to NOT REPEAT THE MISTAKES and kill more of our nations finest people.

NASA should concentrate on scientific robotic missions and forget about manned missions to the Moon or Mars.

....send the shuttle to the air and space museums and concentrate on scientific missions, like the large array space telescope to look for other earthlike planets, and to learn more about our own planet.

Eventually the urge to explore that has always driven us will cause us to look outward again, and by then we will have the knowledge to do it as safely and efficiently as it could be done.

...Getting to Mars, setting up that big planet-finder space telescope, and sending space probes to Europa and Titan.

I wanted to make sure it gets seen, but since we can't have duplicates in LBN, I decided to post it under a new subject line in GD:

Shuttle to launch despite grave warnings by safety chiefs
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1455691&mesg_id=1455691




Some other sources, however...

Shuttle launch dispute
Melbourne Herald Sun, Australia - 5 hours ago
FLORIDA -- NASA has set a launch date of July 1 for shuttle Discovery despite objections from its chief engineer and top safety officer. ...
Space shuttle doubts
Advertiser Adelaide, Australia - 5 hours ago
NASA managers say they will launch the first space shuttle in almost a year on July 1, despite recommendations against a lift-off attempt by the space agency's ...

NASA, Despite Dissent, Sets Shuttle Date
ABC News - 12 hours ago
Members of the Space Shuttle STS-121 crew head to a count down dress rehearsal at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. on Thursday, June 15, 2006. ...

NASA GOING WITH JULY 1 LAUNCH DATE AMID DISSENT
Houston Chronicle, United States - 15 hours ago
By MARK CARREAU. Top NASA officials on Saturday cleared Discovery for a July 1 launch, despite objections from the agency's chief ...

Best headline: (Sydney Morning Herald)
Shuttle to fly in face of hazard

AFTER a "spirited discussion", NASA officials have decided to launch the space shuttle Discovery as planned on July 1 - against the advice of its engineering and safety chiefs.

After a two-day meeting at the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida that NASA's administrator, Michael Griffin, said involved "intensive and spirited exchange" about safety issues, authorities approved the shuttle flight, which would be the second since the Columbia tragedy in 2003.

At a televised news conference Mr Griffin said that he approved the 13-day flight because he did not feel it presented an undue risk to the crew, even though concerns remained about debris from the shuttle's external fuel tank that could damage the vehicle during the launch.

NASA's top safety official, Bryan O'Conner, and its chief engineer, Christopher Scolese, signed the flight plans, but noted their objections about proceeding without resolving the issue.

The potential problem was rated "probable/catastrophic" according to NASA's complex risk assessment criteria. This means it is more likely than not to cause a catastrophe at some time during the shuttle program.

More:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/shuttle-to-fly-in-face-of-hazard/2006/06/18/1150569210416.html


Also:

WorldNetDaily: NASA plans fake launch July 1st in another attempt to prove Secular theory that Earth is "round."
http://www.Imadethatlastoneup.com


More info:

<snip>

{Richard} Feynman was requested to serve on the presidential Rogers Commission which investigated the Challenger disaster of 1986. Drawing upon clues from a source with inside information, Feynman famously showed on television the crucial role in the disaster played by the booster's O-ring flexible gas seals with a simple demonstration using a glass of ice water, a clamp, and a sample of o-ring material. His opinion of the cause of the accident differed from the official findings and was considerably more critical of the role of management in sidelining the concerns of engineers. After much petitioning, Feynman's minority report was included as an appendix to the official document. The book What Do You Care What Other People Think? includes stories from Feynman's work on the commission. His engineering skill is reflected in his 98% estimate of the Space Shuttle's reliability, which is underscored by the two failures over the 114 flights of the Space Shuttle as of 2006.

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feynman

And:

Rogers Commission Report
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_Commission


And:

Rogers Commission Report
Appendix F - Personal observations on the reliability of the Shuttle
by R. P. Feynman
http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/missions/51-l/docs/rogers-commission/Appendix-F.txt