Steven P. Schneider, Purdue University, School of AAE, 4 Feb. 2003, last revised 28 Feb. 2003.

These are handouts and notes regarding the loss of the Shuttle Orbiter

Columbia on 1 Feb. 2003, apparently associated with reentry heating. The sources are government documents

that are in the public domain; they are cited on the handouts. Many of these handouts and notes

were discussed in class, in AAE519, Hypersonic Aerothermodynamics.

Other data on the class can be found at http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/

Data on the Columbia loss added since the last update of this file can be found at

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/

Data on Purdue hypersonic research in the Boeing/AFOSR Mach-6 Quiet Tunnel can be found

at http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/BAM6QT-Mach-6-tunnel/

Other hypersonics news can be found at http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/hypersonics-news/

Some overall issues that must be considered for any complex engineering system (here a spaceflight) are:

1) How much risk is involved in a flight? Spaceflight involves much higher risks than bridge-building or

commercial transport aircraft, since aircraft can’t get off the ground if they are built with the safety margins

that bridge-builders use. Spacecraft are far more expensive than aircraft, further reducing acceptable

weight and further reducing safety margin; spacecraft also involve exotic, difficult, and risky issues such

as rocket motors, liquid hydrogen and oxygen, reentry, etc. Testing to reduce uncertainty is far more

expensive.

2) What resources are available to reduce risk? (In a complex system, it is always possible to spend more

money to reduce risk).

3) How uncertain is the risk? How uncertain are the predictions and studies?

4) How much funding is available to reduce the uncertainty?

5) Any discussion of risk involves uncertainty. There will be optimists and pessimists. If the pessimists win completely,

the project never starts. If the optimists win completely, insufficient care is probably taken, and too much

risk and uncertainty are tolerated. This then becomes a question of the culture of the organization, the

skill and integrity of the engineers and managers, the perceived pressures on the organization, the level

of funding available, the level of uncertainty and risk that become tolerated, and so on.

Other sources were also discussed but are not placed on this public website due to copyright concerns.

For introductory information on how the shuttle works, see

http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/technology/sts-newsref

See http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/atmo76.pdf for atmospheric properties.

See http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/aedc-Arcs-2003.pdf for a short description

of an arcjet tunnel. This facility simulates the high heating levels present at reentry. Facilities of

this type can be used to test materials such as shuttle tiles. The images on the last page may help

you to picture the high heating rates.

See http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/Iliff-nasa-tm-4499-vu-mod1.pdf for

some data on heating rates to the shuttle, including a crude analysis suggesting that a missing

tile would cause melting of the underlying aluminum within about a minute.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/bouslog-91-0741-vu-2.pdf gives some data

on typical Shuttle trajectories, to which the Columbia news releases are compared. Also, it

gives some data on typical levels of tile damage after earlier flights.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/craig-83-launchdebris-extracts.pdf is a paper

from 1983 describing the early history of thermal protection system (TPS) damage on the shuttle

due to debris impact, and what was being done about it.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/gong-84-1761-vu.pdf gives some trajectory data,

plus some information about the internal structure of the wing, and some heating rate and temperature

data. The internal structure normally reaches maximum temperature AFTER the shuttle has landed,

due to the lag time for the heat to soak through the TPS.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/heat-flux-vs-time.pdf shows the heat flux vs.

time on the wing leading edge, for a nominal trajectory. The reference used is cited on top

of the page – this reference is available on the NASA Johnson web site. It is a study of simulated

meteoroid impact on the RCC (reinforced carbon carbon) leading edge material, and the effects

of heating on the damaged RCC.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/ice-impact-orbiter-tps.pdf is a reference to a paper

which contains test data from ice impacting orbiter tiles. The paper is copyrighted, and thus not

placed on the site. The Purdue library has a copy.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/orbiter-tps-damage-sch.pdf is some results from

a search on the NASA technical report website, www.casi.sti.nasa.gov, looking for papers on

debris impact and shuttle tiles.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/shuttleheating-hertzler.pdf

contains more heating data for the shuttle.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/tile-damage-tankcause.pdf is a reference to a paper

discussing the problem with foam debonding from the external tank. See www.casi.sti.nasa.gov.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/tile-impact-search.txt is more references to papers

on tile impacts and the associated issues.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/tile-improvements-ames-2002.pdf is a reference

to improvements made in ceramic tiles since the shuttle design.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/tile-on-orbit%20repair.pdf is a reference to a 1980

study on the possibility of repairing damaged shuttle TPS and tiles.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/tiledamagepaper.pdf is a reference to a 1993 paper

talking about the need to spend more effort working on tile damage problems.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/transition-shuttle-anwang.pdf is a reference and some

extracts from a paper by government authors on boundary-layer transition data on the orbiter.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/tutorial-laminar-turbulent%20transition.txt is

some tutorial information on laminar-turbulent transition in boundary layers.

http://roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~aae519/columbialoss/columbia-loss-notes.htm brings you back to this

set of notes, with some overall description.