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From: raveling@isi.edu (Paul Raveling)
Newsgroups: sci.aeronautics,sci.space,sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: X-30, Space Station Strangles NASP
Message-ID: <9991@venera.isi.edu>
Date: 4 Oct 89 00:48:00 GMT
References: <5292@eos.UUCP> <4983@omepd.UUCP> <1989Sep29.164255.28849@utzoo.uucp>
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Reply-To: raveling@isi.edu (Paul Raveling)
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In article <5292@eos.UUCP>, eugene@eos.UUCP (Eugene Miya) writes:
> 
> Some years back I was looking at X-15 flight paths.  These weren't trivial
> tests, they had to fly all the way to Utah to launch and get to EAFB.
> Imagine what troubles would have been.

	In the case of the X-15 the high speed part needed lots
	surface space, but once the speed dropped the vertical space
	it needed was another attention-getter.  In the worst case,
	inadvertent speed brake deployment, the landing pattern
	was a 270-overhead, entered from 42,000 feet.

	A vertical view of the pattern up to final approach looks like
	a tightening curve with a typical radius of about a mile.  It's
	a 45-degree banked turn @ 300 kt IAS, winding up as TAS
	decreases with altitude, using about 2 minutes from pattern
	entry to touchdown.  Call it about 20,000 fpm descent rate.


	Can any of the NASA folks post info on the shuttle's
	approaches?  Isn't the standard pattern a simple 180?
	What sorts of descent rate or glide slope profile does
	the shuttle have as a function of altitude & airspeed?


----------------
Paul Raveling
Raveling@isi.edu