29 August 2009

Jarrah's Question No5

Jarrah said: NASA and the US government had various oxygen fires in the past at the Brooks Air Force Base and the Philadelphia air center between 1962 and 1964, which compelled them to compile a report pointing out the danger of pure oxygen environments. Another oxygen fire, this time in Washington DC, cost two men their lives in 1965.

During his testimony to Congress, Frank Borman admitted "We are very aware of the fires at Johnsville Navy Air Station and also at Brooks Air Force Base"

How could NASA not have considered the plugs out test hazardous when they knew about these past oxygen fires all along?

I don't know how many times this needs to be explained to you, but they were in error. It should have been considered hazardous but after using it for 6 years with manned spacecraft without incident, they became complacent. Let me summarise for you, Jarrah:

They were wrong - it should have been classified as hazardous.

They admitted they got it wrong.

They admitted they were terribly wrong.

They admitted that numerous areas of their operations needed to be at the minimum reviewed, but mostly completely overhauled.

It should never of happened - but it did. It wasn't deliberate, despite all the inuendo and aspersions you make.

3 comments:

  1. I don't know how many times this needs to be explained to you, but they were in error. It should have been considered hazardous but after using it for 6 years with manned spacecraft without incident, they became complacent.

    And on each of those previous tests the fire hazard was taken seriously. You saw how whacked-out paranoid NASA went after the Columbia disaster – you’d think that they would be taking the same approach toward Apollo 1 after two men died in a past oxygen fire in Washington and there was every indication that the test was going to be even more hazardous than Mercury and Gemini. They shoe-horned it full of combustibles, they stripped the fireproofing, removed the fire extinguishers and to top it off – sealed the crew in with an inward opening hatch. And appallingly, the Jan 27 1967 was scheduled to be the first and only time it was used. Yes, the first and only. Cooper claims that this was to be the last (and first) time the hatch was used before the safer one was installed to overcome its predecessor’s problems.

    They obviously knew it was going to be a hazard. And you can’t tell me that Frank Borman didn’t know the test was going to be hazardous. Even if he was unaware of the past oxygen fires, he was an Assistant Professor in Thermodynamics. Experts of Thermodynamics are very familiar with bomb calorimeters – a chamber that ignites a food sample in pure oxygen and incinerates it. Yeah, I’m sure Borman didn’t know Apollo 1 was going to be hazardous (sarcasm in case you can’t tell).

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  2. Jarrah, who are you to come along 40+ years later, second guessing and passing judgment on every decision made by NASA and its contractors? You have no formal background in aerospace engineering or related field. You have no experience working on an actual spacecraft project. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you probably weren't even alive at the time.

    Let it go, Jarrah. It was an accident. In retrospect, a very careless one brought on by "moon fever". But to accuse them of "murder" is just beyond the pale. Just let it go.

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