Word: tanked
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...countdown clock flashed out the number of seconds until lift-off, the eyes of an entire nation focused on Launch Pad 39-B and the gleaming white shuttle Discovery, flanked by its two solid rocket boosters and clinging to the side of the giant, rust- colored external fuel tank. In the minds of many, however, another vision intruded: the hellish yellow-orange burst in the middle of a Y-shaped cloud that 32 months earlier had marked the destruction of the shuttle Challenger...
...applause and cheers that grew into a chorus near the two-minute mark, when the spacecraft successfully jettisoned its two spent solid rocket boosters. But experienced space observers did not relax until Discovery shut down its three main engines 6 1/2 minutes later, shucked off its external fuel tank, then slipped safely into orbit about 180 miles above the earth a half hour later. Declared elated space engineer John Kaltenbach: "This was the one that had to fly. It looks damn good. Oh, it just feels so good...
...replacing crucial components of its shuttle fleet. Over the past two years, the space agency has made more than 400 changes in the winged orbiter -- including a much touted new escape system -- the solid rocket boosters, the orbiter's three liquid-fuel engines and the huge external fuel tank. What is more, each of the modifications or changes was laboriously reviewed by the Discovery astronauts. "NASA went far beyond our recommendations and fixed all that we wanted," says Robert B. Hotz, a member of the Rogers commission. "There was a whole series of potential accidents waiting to happen...
NASA took steps to improve the astronauts' chances of survival should such a mishap occur. For the first time since the summer of 1982, the crew left the launch pad ensconced in bulky space suits, each partly pressurized and equipped with an oxygen tank, a parachute and an inflatable raft. In addition, a new emergency escape system was designed to give the astronauts a chance to leave the orbiter quickly in the event of a "benign disaster" after the boosters had fallen away. In such a crisis, the crew would jettison the huge external fuel tank and stabilize the winged...
There was plenty of drama in another tank a couple of subway stops away as swimming began to churn, but what we saw most vividly at first was not theater; it was a delightful geography lesson...