![]() ![]() The shuttle is scheduled to return to Earth for the final time on July 20. This represents the first time iPhones have ever gone to space.Ītlantis will chase the station down for a while, finally docking with the $100 billion orbiting lab on Sunday (July 10). In addition, Atlantis is also carrying two iPhone 4 smartphones loaded with apps to help astronauts perform experiments in space. Atlantis is also delivering several different science experiments, one of which - the Robotic Refueling Mission - is an attempt to demonstrate a way to refuel satellites robotically on orbit. The astronauts will deliver about 9,500 pounds (4,318 kilograms) of cargo to the station. Other shuttle missions over the years have typically carried six or seven spaceflyers, but NASA wanted to use every bit of available space to pack extra cargo on this last drop-off mission to the station. He's joined by pilot Doug Hurley and mission specialists Rex Walheim and Sandy Magnus. "People have taken it for granted I don't think its absence is going to be immediately felt." A skeleton crewĬommander Chris Ferguson is leading a skeleton crew of four on Atlantis' STS-135 flight. "For an entire generation who grew up with the space shuttle, this is a moment that won't be appreciated for some time to come," said space history expert Robert Pearlman, editor of and a contributor. The main goal of the shuttle's 12-day flight - Atlantis' 33rd mission after nearly 26 years of flying - is to deliver a year's worth of supplies and spare parts to the orbiting lab.īut the world's attention is fixed more on what Atlantis' last mission means than on what it will accomplish in orbit. The crew of Atlantis is ready to launch."Īfter 135 launches over 30 years, the space shuttle will never streak into the sky again.Ītlantis and its four-astronaut crew are headed for a rendezvous with the International Space Station. "Let's light this shuttle one more time Mike and witness this nation at its best. We're not ending the journey today, we're completing a chapter of a journey that will never end," Atlantis' commander Chris Ferguson replied. "And so for the final time, Fergie, Doug, Sandy and Rex, good luck, Godspeed and have a little fun up there." "And organizations that do engineering have processes in place to allow technical dissenting opinions."On behalf of the greatest team in the world, good luck to you and your crew on the final flight of this true American icon," shuttle launch director Mike Leinbach told the astronauts just before launch. ![]() "Intimidation, we've learned, is not really tolerated. They now use principles put in place in the name of safety as it begins newer programs, such as the Artemis, to return to the moon and go beyond to Mars.įor example, engineers are now given a forum to air grievances and other issues or concerns. Rocha said NASA learned from the tragedy and that they are different from the NASA of 20 years ago. "‘It'll be a repair, but everything will be fine. ‘There's nothing wrong, this is just a refurbishment issue,'" he said. "They found people who were giving the answers managers wanted. Rocha credits safety issues from that time to this normalization of deviance as well as confirmation bias. The term defines the process in which deviance from correct or proper behavior or rule becomes normalized in a government or corporate culture. Normalization of deviance is a term coined by sociologist Diane Vaughan. I think we're very sensitive to that now," he said. Some of them were the normalization of deviance. "There were certain psychological principles or cultural principles at work that do not serve safety. Rocha said despite urging for pictures from satellites, shuttle managers decided against them. We cannot even start a credible analysis, these thirty-something people on the debris assessment team, until we get a photo." And we cannot tell the extent of the damage or where it hit," he said. "Our struggle in engineering was, ‘hey, that looks bad'. Rocha said he was part of the debris assessment team, which unanimously wanted a better picture of the tile damage that had been sustained during launch. He said managers at the time found engineers who signed-off on the damaged tile as safe for re-entry. Rodney Rocha was the Space Shuttle Chief Engineer at the Johnson Space Center in 2003. ![]() Heat from re-entry later caused the space craft to break up over North Texas and Louisiana. 16, 2003.įebrumarks 20 years since the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated while it re-entered the Earth's atmosphere.Ī piece of foam insulation from the external fuel tank had broken off and damaged a thermal tile on a shuttle wing during launch. NASA Space shuttle Columbia launches on it’s final mission, STS-107, on Jan. ![]()
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