**The most comprehensive collection of Shuttle related presentions and mission documentation, plus expansive daily processing documentation and updates are <\/em>available to download on L2<\/em><\/font> **<\/em><\/font><\/p>\n L2 Members: All documentation used in this article is available to download on the L2 section.<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n Re-live Atlantis\u2019 STS-117 mission with on our Flight Day specific interactive event pages<\/font> \u2013 open to all.<\/em><\/p>\n **LIVE news updates on Atlantis STS-117 Post Launch Processing**<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n **LIVE news updates on Endeavour STS-118 Processing**<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n Aerospace industry analysis (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});<\/p>\n **LIVE news updates on Discovery STS-120 (LON-320) Processing**<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n Article: <\/u><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n Atlantis, set to leave Dryden at Edwards Air Force Base on Friday was initially set to arrive back at KSC on Sunday or Monday, although NASA are now looking to utilize the long summer day\u2019s daylight. <\/p>\n \u2018Current Ferry Flight plan has wheels up from Dryden scheduled for early Friday and landing at KSC Friday afternoon, weather permitting,\u2019 noted processing information on Wednesday. <\/p>\n Post launch operations are proceeding on schedule, with the hazardous operation known as SCAPE \u2013 where the toxic hypergolic propellants are removed from the orbiter\u2019s OMS and RCS engines \u2013 completed on Tuesday night. The protective tailcone \u2013 used to reduce the drag the orbiter adds to the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft \u2013 will be installed on Thursday, depending on the weather. <\/p>\n Atlantis is also in the midst of a level of TPS evaluation and cosmetic work ahead of her trip back to Florida, with the port OMS Pod blanket now removed ahead of rebonding for the cross-country flight. <\/p>\n That blanket was seen protruding during the early flight days of STS-117, ultimately causing a temporary repair on orbit during EVA-3. While that blanket peeled up slightly during the latter parts of Atlantis\u2019 return to Earth, the repair was deemed highly successful, as observed by what seems to be a clean graphite expoxy shell, which the blanket protects against intense heat of re-entry.<\/p>\n \u2018Leading edge of repaired LH OMS blanket had lifted approximately 1 inch. There was a small gap visible between the inboard adjacent blanket and the tile,\u2019 mentioned the latest post-flight TPS evaluation presentation. \u2018The blanket was later removed for failure analysis prior to ferry flight.\u2019<\/p>\n These initial evaluations recorded between 176 and 292 hits to the orbiter from visual inspections, 17 of those being greater than one inch in diameter. This is likely to be updated again once engineers receive Atlantis back in her OPF (Orbiter Processing Facility) in a few days time.<\/p>\n \u2018The Orbiter TPS sustained a total of 292 hits \u2013 with an attached graph showing 176 hits \u2013 of which 17 had a major dimension of one inch or larger. This total does not include the numerous hits on the base heat shield attributed to SSME vibration\/acoustics and exhaust plume recirculation,\u2019 added the presentation.<\/p>\n \u2018There is a large concentration of debris hits between the main landing gear and the ET doors. This may<\/i> be an event caused during landing. Samples were taken from two debris locations forward of the body flap just inboard of the LH elevon that match up with a debris strike seen from the LH SRB camera looking aft.\u2019<\/p>\n \u2018There was a fuselage stub tile at the body flap interface that lost the entire corner, approximately 4\u201d by 2\u201d,\u2019 the report added, although this did not appear to cause any issues during re-entry.<\/p>\n Once Atlantis is back in her OPF, repairs will take place \u2013 as is normal for all post flight processing \u2013 in tandem with preparations for her December 6 flight on STS-122.<\/p>\n L2 members<\/font>: All documentation \u2013 from which the above article has quoted snippets \u2013 is available in full in the related L2 sections, updated live.<\/em><\/p>\n **STARLIGHT: BRAND NEW STS-117 MISSION REVIEW MUSIC VIDEO**<\/font><\/em><\/font> -. **NASASpaceflight.com Job Opportunities**<\/em><\/font> <\/font><\/em><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" NASA are discussing the potential of returning Atlantis back to the Kennedy Space Center over the space of just a single day, with an early morning flight on Friday arriving back in Florida the same evening. Atlantis is undergoing preparations for her ferry flight from the Dryden Flight Research Center, which has revealed further reports […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41676"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41676"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41676\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}**Ride home through the fire and plasma of re-entry with Atlantis on STS-115 \u2013 And now also with Discovery on STS-116 \u2013 TWO Stunning high quality 2hr, 355mb videos \u2013 from deorbit burn to post landing**<\/font><\/p>\n
A full sweep of the orbiter listing areas of interest, although all appear to show Atlantis enjoyed a very clean flight. The only highlighted area was a tile at the aft of the orbiter. <\/p>\n
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<\/em><\/font>(Video section is FREE, but you need to sign up as a member of the forum to enter the video section of the site. We only use your e-mail to send you your password. It will not be used for spam etc.)<\/em><\/font><\/em><\/p>\n