Wayne Hale
Wayne Hale
N. Wayne Hale Jr.is a former NASA engineer. Previously a flight director and space shuttle program manager, Hale served as NASA's Deputy Associate Administrator for Strategic Partnerships prior to his retirement on July 31, 2010...
bad craft flight pieces time
Any time you have pieces come off your craft in flight it's a really bad day.
proceed prove remain remains safe until work
I remain optimistic. There remains a lot of work to be done. We won't proceed until we've done the work to prove that it's safe to fly.
flights fly optimistic remain three time
I remain optimistic that if we fly by this summer, we will be able to get three flights off. But time will tell. This is not like the railroad.
beginning bullish
I'm beginning to feel very bullish about the possibility of making May,
definitely
I definitely would not take that off the table.
appears based begin board discussion launch program window work yesterday
However, based on the discussion we had at the program board yesterday it appears that the May launch window is something we can begin to work on -- the launch window May 3 to May 23.
accelerate believe case decided eliminate fairly flight folks hazard large might piece ramp ready remove strong third
In the long run, we have decided we would like to remove this fairly large piece of foam, just eliminate the hazard that it might cause. We think we have a very strong case to be ready to take that ramp off by the third flight tank. Some folks believe we can accelerate that and potentially even remove it for the STS-121 tank.
fact flight gap happened job known product time
The gap fillers, that's a product of the fact that we can see more and do a better job of evaluating. That's probably something that's happened in flight before, but this is the first time we've known about it and could take remedial action.
best choice decision engineers lowest management team
The lowest risk, the best choice and the unanimous decision of the engineers in the management team is that we should re-enter as is.
moving space flying
Having three operational vehicles in the fleet affords the shuttle program great schedule flexibility as we move toward flying safely and completing the international space station.
past roulette damage
The Columbia accident made us realize that we had been playing Russian roulette with the shuttle crews -- that we had been very, very fortunate in the past that the foam did not cause critical damage.
aerodynamics lines normal
The bottom line is there is large uncertainty because nobody has a very good handle on the aerodynamics at those altitudes and at those speeds. Given that large degree of uncertainty, life could be normal during entry or some bad things could happen.