BALLISTIC PERFORMANCE OF EXTERNAL TANK INSULATING FOAM ON SPACE SHUTTLE THERMAL PROTECTION SYSTEM COMPONENTS

摘要

After the Space Shuttle Columbia accident on February 1, 2003, NASA and Southwest Research Institute conducted an impact study to determine if insulating foam from the external tank could have caused the disaster. Gun barrels with rectangular cross sections were fabricated to launch foam projectiles using SwRI's large compressed gas gun. The targets were instrumented with strain gages, displacement gages and accelerometers. Up to 16 high speed video cameras were used to capture images of the impact and the resulting damage. The results of numerous preliminary tests on surrogate targets and several impact tests on actual flight hardware will be discussed.