Space shuttle crashes

Is the flight path of the shuttle over any populated territory? If it is, what if it crashed there? Is this enough to end the Space Program?
 
Well, it does (did?) fly over southern California. If you saw the movie "The Core" it did 'crash' land in the Los Angeles River Basin. The approach paths were probably originally chosen so that it did not fly over any heavily populated areas.
 
Last edited:
When the shuttle burned up last year, it's flight path was (approximately) over my home (I live in Dallas) at the time it disintegrated...

Does that count?
 
I'm thinking it kills people on the ground.
I once read a story in Analog magazine where the Shuttle hitting a schoolyard ends the Space program...it was an AH of the Challenger disaster.
 
Unlikely. There was a mid-air collision in the 1950s that had debris from two airliners crash onto a school. That event certainly didn't end civil aviation. Are you thinking about the shuttle, in one piece on its final approach crashing, rather than breaking up on reentry?
 

Nonny

Banned
At take off, its several million gallons of kerosene & lox have the explosive power of a small A bomb. Now that falling in one piece on Daytona Beach or Miami spells the end of the Shuttle!
 
This is an odd question. Judging from Scott's observation we have little to worry about while the thing's in orbit or beginning its descent unto the upper atmosphere. Also, on reentry it has expended all its fuel, so its not going to explode like a jetliner if it crashes on final approach. THey take off to the east over the Atlantic, so if something goes wrong there, it will only hurt a few fish (and astronauts unfotunately). Personally, I have a hard time imagining any possible disaster with the space shuttle ending "the space program". It might kill the shuttle, but we still will be shooting up rockets and capsules until something better gets developed.
 
Debris rained down all over TX and LA, I don't remember any reports of fatalities (some very limited property damage though) as a result...

I rather doubt that almost any space-related disaster would shut down the program...it might (as I hope it does with the shuttle) shut down that particular piece of the program...

Now lets hope that NASA gets out of the way, and we see some action from the private sector...
 

Nonny

Banned
Interestingly, the only one's that launch their rockets to the West are the Israelis, so that their spy satellites won't land accidentally in Jordan, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan or Iraq during the first critical 10 minutes. Launching to the West, counter to the Earth's (or the Universe's if you're a Geocentrist) rotation results in a really low, marginal "mean" 70 mile high orbit!
 
Top