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Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#51

Post by [deleted] »

klabb3 wrote: post #38
taylorhou wrote: post #36

Speaking of finding, we still haven't found a significant trace of MH370. T_T

There's a lot found that very likely belongs to the airplane. It's just not a particularly sexy story. Most likely it's pilot murder-suicide, they did find a highly suspicious looking path in the pilot/copilot's flight sim. Iirc, during the handover from Malaysia to Vietnam ATCs, the pilot depressurizes the cabin, turns off transponders, turns around to avoid civilian radar, and once out of radar reach heads south ac…

[deleted]

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#52

Post by bboygravity »

afterburner wrote: post #50
Grimburger wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sure about that? Humans regularly work at 30x atmospheric pressure and can probably go to 100x https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/32640/what-is-the-...

These seem to talk mostly about diving, where you breathe from a regulated air supply. I assume that air supply is not at 30-100x atmospheric pressure?

If the air supply wouldn't be at a slightly higher pressure than that, the air would get sucked out of your lungs as far as I understand.

This is why dive tanks run out way way faster the deeper you go (around 1 hour at 18 meters deep and around 10 minutes at 30+ meters out the top of my head).

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#54

Post by kortilla »

anshumankmr wrote: post #40
klabb3 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a lot found that very likely belongs to the airplane. It's just not a particularly sexy story. Most likely it's pilot murder-suicide, they did find a highly suspicious looking path in the pilot/copilot's flight sim. Iirc, during the handover from Malaysia to Vietnam ATCs, the pilot depressurizes the cabin, turns off transponders, turns around to avoid civilian radar, and once out of radar reach heads south ac…

>the pilot depressurizes the cabin, turns off transponders, turns around to avoid civilian radar wtf... Why is there a way for one person to depressurise the cabin?

Wait till you find out what they can do with the little steering wheel like thing and the other levers in front of them!

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#56

Post by bmitc »

regularfry wrote: post #55
bmitc wrote: post #53

Does such a piece emit any radiation?

Seems unlikely, ignoring baseline background emission. Any particular reason to think it would?

It's just my assumption would be to not to get near it unless I knew for sure. The spacecraft would obviously be bombarded with huge amounts of radiation in space. Astronauts inside these vessels experience rather high doses of radiation. The question revolves around the materials used and whether they become irradiated or not and stay as such or not. I would assume that they would select materials that do not continuing radiating once back on Earth at a concerning level, but I don't know enough about materials to know that and this appears to be an external piece.

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#57

Post by jjeaff »

themerone wrote: post #46
googlryas wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It could be U shaped and not just a flat panel. Also, I assume the ceramic tiles have a very low coefficient of friction, so if it was stuck at any kind of small angle, the sediment might easily get carried off.

I got to hold a sample of one of the white tiles a long time ago. I don't know if it was identical to the flown versions, but it was anything but smooth. I remember being able to feel and see individual silica fibers. It was very much a 3d surface.

I believe they are rather similar to the fire tiles you can get to line the inside of a blacksmith's furnace. They are quite light, but also very fragile.

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#58

Post by Goz3rr »

bmitc wrote: post #56
regularfry wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems unlikely, ignoring baseline background emission. Any particular reason to think it would?

It's just my assumption would be to not to get near it unless I knew for sure. The spacecraft would obviously be bombarded with huge amounts of radiation in space. Astronauts inside these vessels experience rather high doses of radiation. The question revolves around the materials used and whether they become irradiated or not and stay as such or not. I would assume that they would select materials that do not contin…

Bombarding something with radiation usually does not make it radioactive itself

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#59

Post by heavenlyblue »

afterburner wrote: post #50
Grimburger wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sure about that? Humans regularly work at 30x atmospheric pressure and can probably go to 100x https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/32640/what-is-the-...

These seem to talk mostly about diving, where you breathe from a regulated air supply. I assume that air supply is not at 30-100x atmospheric pressure?

Air supply is at that pressure, but they don't breathe the same mix as atmospheric air. Atmospheric air becomes narcotic at 4 atmospheres.

Re: Divers accidentally find a piece of the Challenger space shuttle

#60

Post by mattashii »

Grimburger wrote: post #49
userbinator wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or in case of overpressure, which can be just as bad.

You sure about that? Humans regularly work at 30x atmospheric pressure and can probably go to 100x https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/32640/what-is-the-...

I don't think airplane hulls are designed for more than 1 Atm of pressure differential between cabin and the outside; according to the wikipedia article [0] on cabin pressurization normal values are between 540 and 690 hPa pressure differential are normal.

If the cabin has an overpressure event, the hull might pop like a balloon, leading to a decompression event.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabin_pressurization

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