Aug 28 1985
From The Space Library
A Titan 34-D booster carrying a classified payload, possibly a reconnaissance satellite, exploded August 28 minutes after launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base, the NY Times reported. Because of the classified payload, the Air Force revealed little information about the launch. Booster rockets typically carried an internal destruct package that ground controllers could activate in the event of a malfunction.
The explosion and subsequent crash of the booster started a 20-acre brush fire near the launch pad. An Air Force spokesman said it took firefighters more than five hours to extinguish the blaze.
The Air Force was conducting an investigation to determine the cause of the booster failure. (NYT, Aug 31/85, A14)
Already far ahead of their work schedule, astronauts aboard Discovery on Space Shuttle mission 51-I began preparing tools they would use in an attempt to revive the U.S. Navy Leasat 3 satellite, the Washington Post reported.
Mission planners had hoped the satellite repairs could be made during an August 30 spacewalk, but they added another spacewalk for August 31 because ground tests showed that the Space Shuttle crippled robot arm could not work fast enough to complete the repair job in one day.
“It appears we are faced with a two-EVA (extravehicular activity) plan,” flight director Bill Reeves said. He blamed a failed circuit that prevented Discovery's robot arm from operating in an automatic mode. Reeves noted that ground tests showed that the robot arm, when operated manually, would need about 75% more time to maneuver the Syncom 3 satellite and that it would take two 6-and-a-half hour spacewalks to complete the repair.
Mission specialists Dr. James Van Hoften and Dr. William Fisher spent about four hours August 28 checking out electronic gear they would use to repair the satellite.
Mission specialist John Lounge would work the robot arm from inside the cockpit, while van Hoften and Fisher worked outside on the satellite. The robot arm would play a crucial role, holding van Hoften in place while he worked on the satellite 35 feet above the cargo bay.
Lounge would also use the robot arm to help van Hoften turn the satellite so Fisher, standing in foot restraints inside the bay, could remove a panel and disengage a timing lever, then plug two electrical cables into the panel and, in effect, jump start the satellite. (W Post, Aug 29/85, A3)
As a result of a Manchester, England, airline accident in which it was believed a wing-mounted engine on the Boeing 737 disintegrated as the plane was attempting to take off [see Aviation/Civil Aviation, Aug. 26], the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was trying to decide today how many of about 5,000 Pratt & Whitney jet engines operated by U.S. commercial airlines required inspection for possible cracks, the Washington Times reported. Airline officials believed a fire started after the accident when a faulty combustion chamber in the plane's Pratt & Whitney JT8D engine blew apart and a hot piece of the combustion chamber pierced the plane's wing fuel tank.
British inspectors said preliminary investigations into the Manchester accident showed that deterioration in the combustion chamber caused overheating and eventually failure of the part. Investigators said they found “extensive cracking” in six of the engine's nine combustion chambers.
In addition to use on the Boeing 737, Pratt & Whitney sold the same kind of engine for Boeing 727s and McDonald Douglas DC9s. Those planes made up about two-thirds of the 3,000 planes operated by the major U.S. airlines. The FAA was attempting to arrange the engine inspections without disrupting U.S. airline service and indicated there would be no inspections of newer engines because there was insufficient hours on them. Inspections were made in one of two ways: an isotope inspection, which was similar to x-raying the engine to search for cracks or a visual inspection, which required dismantling the engine to get to the combustion chambers.
An inspection of JT8D engines ordered by the British Civil Aviation Authority turned up serious combustion chamber cracks in five Boeing 737s, and the planes were grounded. (W Times, Aug 29/85, 8B)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
