Scav
Mostly Harmless
- Joined
- May 8, 2010
- Messages
- 1,002
- Reaction score
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- Points
- 48
Finally something I'm happy with. 
Here is:
SEP-008, Chapter 5.
The pyrotechnic charges blew, shredding the bolts holding VARIS in place.
The report waved through Constitution in the form of a loud, dull thud, and at least one head looked up in a state of mild startlement in spite of the fact they'd been told it was coming.
"Houston, Constitution. VARIS is deployed, over," Mission Specialist Two, Jamie Cunningham said dryly into her microphone. "Greg, can you give me some more Z-minus here?"
"On it," Pilot Greg Williams said crisply as he reached for the control stick. The RCS system shot off its gasses dutifully, and Constitution lurched slowly away from its constituent satellite.
"Constitution, Houston. We're getting some good video of the satellite. Looks like a good release, and a beautiful satellite that's going to provide us with some excellent information on the radiation belt environment for several years to come. Stand by for maneuvering information."
The pallet responsible for holding the Van Allen Radiation Intensity Survey Satellite were designed with spring-loaded clamps held in place by explosive bolts, intended to impart an ejection velocity upon the satellite when released. The new procedure, brought in part by last-minute improvisation and an unfortunate (but thankfully not deadly) glitch in the mission called for an immediate trajectory adjustment upon release, followed by an orbit destabilization burn.
"Roger that, Houston. Constitution stands ready to copy," Mission Commander Brian Adkinson replied.
"Okay, Constitution. Set pitch to plus niner-zero degrees. Yaw to negative twelve point three zero degrees, and roll to negative one-eight-zero degrees."
"Pitch to plus niner-zero, yaw to negative twelve point three, and yaw to negative one eighty, roger," Adkinson replied as Williams punched in the information into his terminal. Constitution began to pirouette in space as it angled itself for the proper attitude.
"...and when you get to your orientation attitude, the burn is 1 minute, 29 seconds at five thousand kilonewtons of thrust. We'll have approximately eighty-five minutes before entry interface after that."
"Roger that, Houston. Constitution stands ready to execute."
"Constitution, Houston. You are go for orbit destabilization burn."
"Roger. Go for deorbit burn."
Greg Williams punched the last series of buttons; the ones to arm the main thrusters aboard Constitution, and to lock the burn programming into the thruster control processor.
The floor vibrated subtly as the thrusters did their magic.
* * *
"Constitution, Houston. We show approximately twelve minutes to entry interface; recommend you configure the vehicle and stow all loose articles."
"Stow all loose articles, right," Adkinson said to the air in front of him. Constitution was already dropping at a precipitous rate of just under eight thousand feet per second; at least the figures he was seeing from the flight computer were agreeing with what Mission Control was projecting.
"Alright, Brian. I'm closing the doors now," Pilot Greg Williams said as he went about his work.
"Roger that, Houston. We're closing the cargo bay doors now," Adkinson said over the radio. They were still in darkness, crossing over Indonesia . . . not that they could see anything below them. Constitution was level with the horizon, nose-high . . . and he watched the stars slew lazily in front of him as the ship automatically adjusted itself.
"If this program is right, we should hit one gee of deceleration at about forty miles up," Williams quipped. "That ought to put our apogee low enough to stabilize."
"Right. We've got what, three hundred miles to go?"
"Yup, we've crossed that mark just now."
"Better get the radiator in, too. Who knows how well that'll hold up to this."
"Right. I've got confirmation the doors are closed. Here come the radiators."
"Okay, Constitution. Telemetry and tracking both indicate you've got six minutes and thirty seconds before perigee. As you know, this is a time-critical step of the mission; have you got everything ready?"
"Houston, Constitution," Adkinson replied, "We are all set for entry. I've got all three broadcast antennas set for telemetry repeat."
"We confirm that, Constitution. We expect entry interface in two minutes."
Brian Adkinson stared at the stars with a mask of cold precision. There were still about a million things that could go wrong with this stunt. His instrumentation told him his ship (and himself) were falling towards the Earth faster than any vehicle he'd ever flown in, and that included the Soyuz capsule that brought him safely back home so long ago. He busied his mind with the particulars of the maneuver; all he had to do was monitor hull temperatures and moderate them with the keel of the ship.
Of course, there'd be little time to do anything about a rapid increase in temperatures; about the best he could do was to actually pitch Constitution's nose into the inferno in an effort to chop sink rate. Then he'd only have to worry about burning up the nose of the spacecraft in addition to making her bounce right back into space.
He was assured, of course, that the new ceramic tiles were stronger than anything the Shuttle had flown, and they were right, to an extent. The first four flights had exhibited extensive examination of the keel surfaces with the OBSS arm cameras, and none of them had shown any sort of damage done to them during departure. Hafnium diboride was the buzz word around the hangar for those first heady years of construction, though Adkinson himself would have admitted to anyone that the eggheads in the engineering department could have done better by settling for 'magic ceramic' for the presses.
Then again, Constitution didn't have anything as dangerous as an external fuel tank with the rock-hard foam that had endangered so many flights. Foam that was soft to the touch in and of itself, but like water, could be devastating given the right circumstances.
* * *
"Houston, Constitution," Adkinson called. "Crossing entry interface altitude at a velocity of 29,004 feet per second."
"Roger that, Constitution."
"Crossing three hundred thousand feet," Williams barked out. "APU to auto-startup. Center of gravity shift is online."
"And here goes nothing," Adkinson breathed to the air in front of him. He savored the sudden calmness he felt as he made a few final adjustments to Constitution's attitude. There was nothing that was going to stop him from hitting the atmosphere hard . . . and at this point it suddenly and deliciously felt almost entirely academic.
They just needed to lose a few thousand miles per hour of speed, and they'd be back in the relatively safe confines of low Earth orbit.
* * *
Here is:SEP-008, Chapter 5.
The pyrotechnic charges blew, shredding the bolts holding VARIS in place.
The report waved through Constitution in the form of a loud, dull thud, and at least one head looked up in a state of mild startlement in spite of the fact they'd been told it was coming.
"Houston, Constitution. VARIS is deployed, over," Mission Specialist Two, Jamie Cunningham said dryly into her microphone. "Greg, can you give me some more Z-minus here?"
"On it," Pilot Greg Williams said crisply as he reached for the control stick. The RCS system shot off its gasses dutifully, and Constitution lurched slowly away from its constituent satellite.
"Constitution, Houston. We're getting some good video of the satellite. Looks like a good release, and a beautiful satellite that's going to provide us with some excellent information on the radiation belt environment for several years to come. Stand by for maneuvering information."
The pallet responsible for holding the Van Allen Radiation Intensity Survey Satellite were designed with spring-loaded clamps held in place by explosive bolts, intended to impart an ejection velocity upon the satellite when released. The new procedure, brought in part by last-minute improvisation and an unfortunate (but thankfully not deadly) glitch in the mission called for an immediate trajectory adjustment upon release, followed by an orbit destabilization burn.
"Roger that, Houston. Constitution stands ready to copy," Mission Commander Brian Adkinson replied.
"Okay, Constitution. Set pitch to plus niner-zero degrees. Yaw to negative twelve point three zero degrees, and roll to negative one-eight-zero degrees."
"Pitch to plus niner-zero, yaw to negative twelve point three, and yaw to negative one eighty, roger," Adkinson replied as Williams punched in the information into his terminal. Constitution began to pirouette in space as it angled itself for the proper attitude.
"...and when you get to your orientation attitude, the burn is 1 minute, 29 seconds at five thousand kilonewtons of thrust. We'll have approximately eighty-five minutes before entry interface after that."
"Roger that, Houston. Constitution stands ready to execute."
"Constitution, Houston. You are go for orbit destabilization burn."
"Roger. Go for deorbit burn."
Greg Williams punched the last series of buttons; the ones to arm the main thrusters aboard Constitution, and to lock the burn programming into the thruster control processor.
The floor vibrated subtly as the thrusters did their magic.
* * *
"Constitution, Houston. We show approximately twelve minutes to entry interface; recommend you configure the vehicle and stow all loose articles."
"Stow all loose articles, right," Adkinson said to the air in front of him. Constitution was already dropping at a precipitous rate of just under eight thousand feet per second; at least the figures he was seeing from the flight computer were agreeing with what Mission Control was projecting.
"Alright, Brian. I'm closing the doors now," Pilot Greg Williams said as he went about his work.
"Roger that, Houston. We're closing the cargo bay doors now," Adkinson said over the radio. They were still in darkness, crossing over Indonesia . . . not that they could see anything below them. Constitution was level with the horizon, nose-high . . . and he watched the stars slew lazily in front of him as the ship automatically adjusted itself.
"If this program is right, we should hit one gee of deceleration at about forty miles up," Williams quipped. "That ought to put our apogee low enough to stabilize."
"Right. We've got what, three hundred miles to go?"
"Yup, we've crossed that mark just now."
"Better get the radiator in, too. Who knows how well that'll hold up to this."
"Right. I've got confirmation the doors are closed. Here come the radiators."
"Okay, Constitution. Telemetry and tracking both indicate you've got six minutes and thirty seconds before perigee. As you know, this is a time-critical step of the mission; have you got everything ready?"
"Houston, Constitution," Adkinson replied, "We are all set for entry. I've got all three broadcast antennas set for telemetry repeat."
"We confirm that, Constitution. We expect entry interface in two minutes."
Brian Adkinson stared at the stars with a mask of cold precision. There were still about a million things that could go wrong with this stunt. His instrumentation told him his ship (and himself) were falling towards the Earth faster than any vehicle he'd ever flown in, and that included the Soyuz capsule that brought him safely back home so long ago. He busied his mind with the particulars of the maneuver; all he had to do was monitor hull temperatures and moderate them with the keel of the ship.
Of course, there'd be little time to do anything about a rapid increase in temperatures; about the best he could do was to actually pitch Constitution's nose into the inferno in an effort to chop sink rate. Then he'd only have to worry about burning up the nose of the spacecraft in addition to making her bounce right back into space.
He was assured, of course, that the new ceramic tiles were stronger than anything the Shuttle had flown, and they were right, to an extent. The first four flights had exhibited extensive examination of the keel surfaces with the OBSS arm cameras, and none of them had shown any sort of damage done to them during departure. Hafnium diboride was the buzz word around the hangar for those first heady years of construction, though Adkinson himself would have admitted to anyone that the eggheads in the engineering department could have done better by settling for 'magic ceramic' for the presses.
Then again, Constitution didn't have anything as dangerous as an external fuel tank with the rock-hard foam that had endangered so many flights. Foam that was soft to the touch in and of itself, but like water, could be devastating given the right circumstances.
* * *
"Houston, Constitution," Adkinson called. "Crossing entry interface altitude at a velocity of 29,004 feet per second."
"Roger that, Constitution."
"Crossing three hundred thousand feet," Williams barked out. "APU to auto-startup. Center of gravity shift is online."
"And here goes nothing," Adkinson breathed to the air in front of him. He savored the sudden calmness he felt as he made a few final adjustments to Constitution's attitude. There was nothing that was going to stop him from hitting the atmosphere hard . . . and at this point it suddenly and deliciously felt almost entirely academic.
They just needed to lose a few thousand miles per hour of speed, and they'd be back in the relatively safe confines of low Earth orbit.
* * *
