Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!athena.mit.edu!gordo
From: gordo@athena.mit.edu (Garet G Nenninger)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: RE: Shuttle Escape Systems
Message-ID: <5214@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU>
Date: 9 May 88 20:15:14 GMT
Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU
Reply-To: gordo@athena.mit.edu (Garet G Nenninger)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 21
Keywords:

cc: kas@hp-pcd.hp.com


Ken, you are correct in saying that the shuttle is designed to
re-enter at very high mach numbers, but that is going *forward*.  The
data I've seen says that the shuttle would separate at it's nose
fitting but would be pinned against the two aft fittings.  The
resulting torque would slam the shuttle's nose away from the ET/SRB
stack, so that the shuttle would have an angle of attack of about 90
degrees.  That's definitely not something it was designed for.  If you
remember that Delta failure a few years back, when the rocket lost
directional control and pitched over 20 degrees or so, the shroud was
ripped off and it had begun to tear apart even before the range safety
officer destroyed it.

I'm not sure about the SRB plume problem, but keep in mind that the
shuttle tiles are very brittle ceramic and that there is plenty of
particulate matter in an SRB plume.  (The brittleness of the tiles is
the reason they cannot launch through rain--it would batter the tiles
like a sandblaster.)  The SRB plume is also very corrosive.  While the
tiles really aren't needed if the separation were low enough (hence no
atmoshpheric heating), the only thing under them is a thin aluminum
skin.  It wouldn't take long for the plume to eat or burn through
that if the tiles were blasted off.