After the scrubbed launch on Sunday, NASA engineers walked around the Shuttle to inspect it and found a rather substantial crack in the insulation on the external fuel tank. They also found a piece of foam on the launch structure that apparently fell from or near the crack. It’s unclear how big of a deal this is, but it’s all over the web: CNN, MSNBC, SpaceFlightNow, and others. The Orlando Sentinel has a story with an image that might be of the crack (they don’t say exactly):
No doubt there will be a public statement from NASA about this very soon, as they were planning on trying to launch again on Tuesday. I’ll post as soon as I hear anything.
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:16 am
Will this lead to NASA scrubbing the mission even further? Seems to me that they have checked this spacecraft so thoroughly that it would make it the safest launch yet… There’s always a risk in sending people into space using rockets, a risk we’ll have to live with…
I want to see the shuttle launch on Tuesday, enough stalling!
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:33 am
Guess we just have to wait and see…
Of course, any problem related to foam now is bound to freak every media up.
July 3rd, 2006 at 1:32 pm
I laughed out loud at a headline about this on MSNBC just now. I have it on my blog as “The Real Trouble at NASA”.
For those who don’t want to click through, the headline simply read:
“Crack May Delay Shuttle”
I can see how a bunch of toked-up crack-head astronauts might put a kink in the launch schedule, I’m just surpised they’d come right out and admit it like that. At least use that “foam” euphamism they’ve been throwing around, geez.