Word: boosterism
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Another booster was the team's trip to France in March, LaRaja says: "It was a real confidence-builder. We played well and got to see top-notch teams...
Earlier in the week, addressing a problem that must be solved before any shuttle can fly, NASA tentatively selected a $500 million redesign for the shuttle's solid-fuel booster, the rocket responsible for the disaster. "We have taken every step to understand what failed on the Challenger and to incorporate a design that won't allow that to happen again," said John Thomas, who headed the modification effort at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. Formal adoption, which might take months, will hinge on exhaustive tests by both the agency and booster contractor Morton Thiokol...
...degrees temperatures, which weakened an O ring, one of a pair of synthetic-rubber washers that keep hot gases from squirting through tiny gaps in the joint between sections of the solid-fuel rocket. When the O ring failed, escaping gas cut into the shuttle's liquid-fuel booster like a blowtorch and triggered a massive explosion. The modified design, said Thomas, will make a repeat catastrophe virtually impossible...
...proposal has the advantage of using booster sections that already exist, and the primary alterations will be made only at the joints. So testing could begin at Morton Thiokol's Brigham City, Utah, plant later this month. But starting from scratch is still under consideration. Says Thomas: "The solid-rocket industry is to provide, by the end of October, a clean-sheet design (of solid boosters), which means that they are not constrained to existing hardware." Rebuilding the existing boosters, however, now seems the most likely solution, especially since it has the best chance of meeting NASA's current takeoff...
Investigators say the accident occurred when ajoint in a solid rocket booster failed and causedsuperheated gases to burn through the externalfuel tank containing liquid hydrogen and liquidoxygen, triggering the explosion...