Shuttle engineer says he's off team (update)

The Johnson Space Center's director of engineering said Monday that NASA has removed him from the management team for the space shuttle flight scheduled for Saturday after he expressed support for workers who questioned preparations for the flight.

Charles Camarda, 54, a former shuttle astronaut and veteran aerospace engineer, said in an e-mail to colleagues that his removal from involvement in the scheduled launch of Discovery, on which he flew last year, was against his will. The e-mail was distributed to others, including reporters.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4004817.html

:sarcasm:

bu$hCo cannot tolerate anyone who has the temerity to speak the Truth.

I read that on the very first shuttle flight, it was almost destroyed when a microscopic fleck of paint hit the windshield. At $600+ million per flight, the money could be well spent elsewhere. Why risk the lives?

Obviously the culture of NASA is very much like the repuke culture: ignore real science and fire anyone who disagrees with their leaders. NASA, when it comes to the "shuttle", makes me sick. Appalling.

Pentagon needs the Moon to base its new missiles and high energy weapons!

like Boeing and Honeywell, who are really hurting because it's not like they've got a lot of defense contracts to keep them afloat.
:eyes:

Camarda was among seven astronauts aboard Discovery as the shuttle lifted off July 26 as part of NASA's first comeback attempt. The launch was accompanied by more falling foam, including a 1-pound chunk that tumbled close to the right wing.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4004817.html

Remember, whenever you have to ask "Why?", the answer is usually $$$.

to launching the shuttle in freezing temperatures?

The shuttle is unsafe at any launch!

n/t

.....woodpeckers, a 'faulty sensor' (the old standby), or weather, etc., and at least be delayed a few weeks.

It would seem odd that the Director of the Engineering Directorate at JSC would be removed from the MMT (Mission Management Team) 5 days before a Launch with no impact. That somehow doesn't seem right.

It looks like NASA has slid Steve Altemus over from KSC to fill Camarda's spot.

... slid The Colonel over from KFC.

It's as if they want to have a replay of Challenger and Columbia.

Are we going to have a repeat of the past two shuttle disasters?

...for any Shuttle mission.

So I'd say the odds of that happening are 100-1.

our government is in the shit can. The people who stated the odds are they a credible source or are they bush operatives?

I dunno. I worked for the Space Program prior to 2001, so unless NASA was being infiltrated by Bush operatives before he ever took office I kinda doubt that my colleagues were Bush operatives.

On the other hand, he was the Governor of Texas at the time, and I was working at JSC, which is in Houston. So maybe you're on to something. :tinfoilhat:

Actually, the 100-1 odds are pessimistic. Those were the odds when the Shuttle Program started. Now they're closer to 200-1. And of course, different phases of a flight are more dangerous than others. Launch/Ascent, Docking, Undocking and Descent/Landing are all more difficult and therefore more risky than just floating around on orbit.

toadys in positions of power in all agencies. Remember when one of his appointees told NASA scientist not to mention the big bang? How many times have scientist been told to shut up or have had their works altered to fit the political/religious agenda of the bush administration? How often has dissent been squashed at NASA. I am not dissing the scientists and technicians at NASA, I am focusing on the political appointments who have gutted the scientific to favor the military and have cut funding to the bare minimum.

Humans greatly complicate the problem!

snip>
Opportunity is healthy. The rover has started receiving a new flight software load. It also advanced 138.1 meters (453 feet) toward "Victoria Crater" in three sols of driving and observed outcrop targets. As of sol 855 (June 20) Opportunity was 780 meters (just under half a mile) from Victoria Crater and about 300 meters (984 feet) from "Beagle Crater."

Engineers are uploading new flight software to both Opportunity and Spirit. The upload process is expected to take several weeks before the new software is installed and used. To expedite this process, the team is gradually increasing the duration of Opportunity's high-gain antenna uplink sessions. No files of the new flight software were uplinked via UHF this week. However, beginning with sol 864 (June 29, 2006), Opportunity will begin receiving flight software files via its daily UHF-band communication window as well as via the X-band high-gain antenna.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/mer/index.cfm

It was planned to run for 90 days!

them... it's bush's FUCKED-UP DYSFUNCTIONAL 'MUR-KA, DAMMIT!

left the govt....

to run NASA -- the people who actually know science get the shaft.

not the current one. Mike Griffin is a first class engineer and scientist.
Nixon destroyed the shuttle program before it ever flew.

The clergy maintained that Galileo
Was a wicked and a senseless man.
Galileo was senseless.
But as time demonstrated,
He who is senseless is much wiser.
A fellow scientist of Galileo's age
Was no less wise than Galileo.
He knew the Earth revolved,
But - he had a family.
And he, stepping into a carriage with his wife,
Having accomplished his betrayal,
Considered himself advancing his career,
Whereas he undermined it.
For his assertion of our planet,
Galileo faced the risk alone
And became truly great.
Now this
To my mind, this is a true careerist!
Thus - salute to the career!

This was set to music by Shostakovich in his symphony No. 13 "Babi Yar."

They're the ones who built the thing, keep it running, and know it inside and out. They're the ones who should be on the team to make decisions on when to launch and everything else. Dangit! Haven't they learned anything from NASA's long history?

Not the orbiter itself, nor with the science performed on mission, but with the way we get the bird up there in the first place. Riding a controlled explosion into space seems to me to be a crude, expensive, and dangerous way to get into space.

Why don't we explore using a magnetic sled for missions that don't require onsite human intervention? We could fire a lot of satellites into orbit without risking a soul....

article about the magnetic sled

Imagine if all that money would be used for healthcare...we could wipe out all diseases.

the space program. Those building-sized computers with tubes and the capacity of an early HP calculator just wouldn't have worked for today's shuttle needs.

THAT they may be able to fix this BIG ASS crack in the foam.

Those arrogant bastards (The Executive Branch and The NASA Leadership) must have their July 4th GLORY moment. :grr: Let's hope and pray that it does NOT prove to be a GORY moment (and preventable one!) instead. :( :thumbsdown:

Maybe he wants a twofer.