🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <9090001@hp-lsd.HP.COM> paulc@hp-lsd.HP.COM (Paul Carroll) writes:


>           I presume you mean the 2 sonic booms?  They were rather loud,
>           but seemed normal given all other sonic booms I've heard.
>           (Lucky and didn't even know it :-)

No, you can hear the airframe noise.  It sounds like a transport, throttled
back to idle.  You're hearing the drag, as it were.  Maybe the crowd was too
loud where you were.

>           By the way, can anyone inform me as to why there are 2 sonic
>           booms, and not just one, from the shuttle?  

One from the nose, one from the wingtips/tail.  You can hear a double boom
with any aircraft if the conditions are right.  If the aircraft is flying
really low and fast in the medium altitude supersonic corridor here at
Edwards you'll hear a double boom, but it's not usually as nice as the
Shuttle boom.  When the smaller aircraft is higher or slower the booms run
together and you hear one longer boom, without the high frequency component.

>           As far as how the landing went, it was rather confusing to see
>           the shuttle turning in the East and coming in overhead.  I
>           still expected a crosswind landing and couldn't figure out
>           how the shuttle was going to make it's final lefthand turn
>           (which it didn't, after all).  Still, it looked real good going
>           by almost directly overhead.  

This is the HAC or heading alignment circle.  This lets the pilot line up
on the runway and make the actual reentry path slightly less critical.  For
example, they changed the runway after the de-orbit burn, using the HAC.

>           Also, given there were only some 30,000 people at the landing,
>           it must be a real bear when a few 100,000 people show up.
>           I sat in the traffic jam for about 1.5 hours :-(  Boy, did it
>           get warm.

I don't think there were even 30,000 people--the TV shots from the helicopter
showed a small group.  You're right about the traffic, though.

You can get passes to be over by Dryden for the non-classified landings.
I posted this a while ago and I'll post it again as the next mission is
imminent.
--

M F Shafer
NASA Ames-Dryden Flight Research Facility
shafer@elxsi.dfrf.nasa.gov or shafer@drynix.dfrf.nasa.gov

NASA management doesn't know what I'm doing and I don't know what they're
doing, and everybody's happy this way.