Everyone knows about the Space Shuttle disasters of STS-51L and STS-107, but did you know there were many near misses throughout the program?
Let's talk about it in this thread. 🧵
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Two near misses are relatively well known, STS-27 and STS-93. However, these are only scratching the surface of the issues that haunted the shuttle throughout its entire career.
Here's a (non-exhaustive) list of all the times a shuttle nearly experienced some sort of mission..
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threatening failure or came close to doing so:
- STS-1: SRB overpressure wave damaged the bodyflap of the orbiter. Landing gear cover warped due to thermal damage, many missing tiles in non-crtical areas.
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STS-2: Fuel cells failed leading to a truncated mission. SRB seal anomaly.
STS-6: More-than-acceptable tile loss and thermal damage.
STS-9: Landed with A.P.U on fire.
STS-41B: A chunk of frozen piss struck the OMS pod of Challenger, leading to significant tile damage.
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STS-51D: Left outboard elevon experienced significant burn-through during re-entry. Right brake failed on landing leading to tire blowout.
STS-51F: Center SSME shutdown 5~ minutes into flight resulting in abort-to-orbit.
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STS-61C: An error during fueling led to the drain back of 14,000lbs of LOX from the ET. If this had gone unnoticed, the shuttle would've been forced to perform a transatlantic abort.
STS-27: 700 tiles damaged, 1 missing. Atlantis nearly disintegrated but was saved by an
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antenna mounting plate.
STS-32: Incorrect vector data uploaded to shuttles flight system leading to the orbiter performing several rolls before it could be corrected.
STS-40, STS-42 and STS-45: Abnormally high tile damage.
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STS-91: Chamber pressure sensor in one of the SSMEs failed. If it had occurred later in the flight, RTLS would've been triggered.
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STS-93: During main engine ignition a golden pin used to plug an oxidizer post came loose and was ejected into the chamber wall of the right SSME causing a leak above the main combustion chamber. 5 seconds after liftoff an electrical short caused the shutdown of the center
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engines primary controller and the backup controller for left SSME. SSME3 shutdown early but didn't effect mission orbit drastically.
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STS-95: Drag chute door came loose during launched and impacted center main engines bell.
STS-112: SRB hold-down charges didn't fire. Clamps were ripped off by the SRBs during liftoff.
STS-114: Foam strike. This was the flight immediately after the loss of Columbia on 107.
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STS-116, STS-125: SRB debris hit the underbelly of the orbiter during SRB sep.
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This list was done in numerical order to preserve my sanity.
Thanks for reading an I hope you learned something. :)
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@Punished_Jess
@Orbital_Perigee
It’s both amazing and terrifying that the shuttle had as few losses as it did.
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@Punished_Jess
Thank you! I have always thought the STS was a horrible 'system. All the successes were too costly. I cringe when it is held up as some sort of model for safety in human space flight.
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@Punished_Jess
When people are all “bring back the shuttle,” I’m like “oh hell no. It was expensive and disaster waiting to happen.”
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@Punished_Jess
Of you haven’t read it, Into the Black gives some great detail on the issues on STS-1. It’s incredible they made it back.
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@Punished_Jess
The Orbiter fleet was dangerous. That's why we retired them. Could you imagine what would happen to The Boeing Company if they only made six 737's but two crashed? There would be no more Boeing.
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@Punished_Jess
STS-9 almost launched with an SRB liner that was likely to burn through. They only discovered this after recovering the STS-8 SRBs almost suffered it.
This was found to be due to a change in the manufacturing process (within allowed tolerances)
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