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Shuttle wing under foam fire tests { June 5 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)    http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hsshut053317880jun05,0,5780895.story?coll=ny-health-headlines http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hsshut053317880jun05,0,5780895.story?coll=ny-health-headlines Shuttle Wing Under Gun Investigators hope test will bear out foam damage theory By Earl Lane WASHINGTON BUREAU June 5, 2003 Washington - As researchers prepare to fire a chunk of foam at a mock-up of a space shuttle wing today, a member of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board said a foam projectile in a similar test last week struck a fiberglass wing replica with as much as seven times more force than analysts had expected. The impact rippled through the structure, leaving a crucial seal between two wing panels deformed. "I thought, 'Oh my God, this is something. This isn't just a light bounce,'" said board member G. Scott Hubbard, director of NASA's Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, Calif. Hubbard, speaking at a news briefing in Houston yesterday, said the impact stresses were close to the breaking point of fiberglass but were so brief - less than a thousandth of a second - that it did not break. The key tests start today, when a foam chunk similar to the one that struck the ill-fated Columbia shortly after launch is fired at a wing section using actual hardware from a shuttle's wing rather than fiberglass surrogates. Technicians at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio will use a gas gun to fire the 1.67-pound chunk of foam at about 530 miles per hour against the wing section and its adjoining seal. The U-shaped leading edge panels on the shuttle's wing and the seals between them are made of a composite material called reinforced carbon-carbon. Given that the carbon material is weaker and more brittle than fiberglass, Hubbard said, it is likely that a comparable foam impact will break the material rather than "simply shove it around." In the test with the fiberglass components, the foam deflected a target wing panel while lifting and shoving aside an adjacent seal, Hubbard said. Some of the shattered foam lodged in the long, narrow gap where the seal was displaced. The seal was permanently bent by about 1/10 of an inch. If the composite material breaks, it would lend significant weight to the theory that the post-launch foam debris damaged Columbia's wing edge, eventually allowing hot re-entry gases to enter the wing and destroy the shuttle. Hubbard said any signs of significant damage would move the board "a lot closer toward a very likely initiating event" for the Columbia accident. Copyright © 2003, Newsday, Inc.

Change shuttle design protect from foam Debris prime suspect { February 4 2003 } Debris struck shuttle { February 5 2003 } Foam hit shuttle { February 5 2003 } Foam test reveals damage Heat censored 81 seconds into flight Ignored foam email { February 22 2003 } Nasa doubts foam theory { February 5 2003 } Shuttle wing under foam fire tests { June 5 2003 } Tests affirms foam theory { July 8 2003 } Tests shooting foam chunks { April 30 2003 } Tie between foam heat spike { April 16 2003 } Files Listed: 12

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