# Virgin Galactic Crash



## FLYBOYJ (Nov 2, 2014)

Virgin 'ignored' space safety warnings: expert - Yahoo News

_"Carolynne Campbell, a rocket propulsion expert with the Netherlands-based International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety, said she could not speculate on the cause of Friday's crash without "all the data."

However, she said multiple warnings about the spacecraft's motor and the fuel used to power it had been issued to Virgin since 2007, when three engineers died testing a rocket on the ground.

"Based on the work we've done, including me writing a paper on the handling of nitrous oxide, we were concerned about what was going on at Virgin Galactic," she told AFP.

"I sent copies of the paper to various people at Virgin Galactic in 2009, and they were ignored."_

One problem Ms Campbell - this aircraft was built and AFAIK registered to Scaled Composites.

It's ashamed that after a tragedy, you find these people looking for their 15 minutes of fame

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## pbehn (Nov 2, 2014)

Flyboy similarly I find the word "anomaly" nauseating. That is a word to avoid litigation . The rocket did not have suffer an "anomaly" it broke up in mid air and if they dont suss why then that avenue of commercial space flight is closed. Just imagine the law suits if there were 6 billionaires on the flight, sad to say it would be a bigger stink than "just a couple of test pilots". below are the definitions of anomaly, they do not apply to catastrophic failure of a rocket.
Examples Word Origin
noun, plural anomalies.
1.
a deviation from the common rule, type, arrangement, or form.
Synonyms: abnormality, exception, peculiarity.
2.
someone or something that is abnormal or incongruous, or does not fit in; an anomalous person or thing:
With his quiet nature, he was an anomaly in his exuberant family.
Synonyms: abnormality, exception, peculiarity.
3.
an odd, peculiar, or strange condition, situation, quality, etc.
4.
an incongruity or inconsistency.
5.
Astronomy. a quantity measured in degrees, defining the position of an orbiting body with respect to the point at which it is nearest to or farthest from its primary.
6.
Meteorology. the amount of deviation of a meteorological quantity from the accepted normal value of that quantity.
7.
Grammar, irregularity.
Origin Expand


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## GrauGeist (Nov 2, 2014)

She's a tool...

Spaceship 2 was running a motor developed in house and is using an entirely different system than the original motor. The original engine used the HTPB formula with N2O as the oxidizer, the new motor (SS2) uses thermoplastic polyamide...


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## Siddley (Nov 2, 2014)

I took a look at their homepage and as soon as I read the words 'sustainable' and 'progressive' in their mission statement that told me everything I needed to know about them.
They don't actually do anything, they just set themselves up with the aim of telling other people what to do...

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## pbehn (Nov 2, 2014)

Siddley said:


> I took a look at their homepage and as soon as I read the words 'sustainable' and 'progressive' in their mission statement that told me everything I needed to know about them.
> They don't actually do anything, they just set themselves up with the aim of telling other people what to do...



I havnt seen the page but I bet it has a "moving forward" slipped in there.


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 2, 2014)

pbehn said:


> Flyboy similarly I find the word "anomaly" nauseating. That is a word to avoid litigation



Actually it's a common word used to describe an issue when an aircraft or rocket is being tracked with telemetry equipment, obviously when something has gone wrong.


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## pbehn (Nov 2, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Actually it's a common word used to describe an issue when an aircraft or rocket is being tracked with telemetry equipment, obviously when something has gone wrong.



Yes Flyboyj like I said. When you are tracking it you may have an anomaly on your instruments, when it is seen to break up and be photographed coming down in the desert that is something else. It seemed to me the persons concerned were taking the vocabulary of one innocuous situation and applying it to another disasterous one. No way does anomaly apply to the photos I have seen.


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 2, 2014)

pbehn said:


> Yes Flyboyj like I said. When you are tracking it you may have an anomaly on your instruments, when it is seen to break up and be photographed coming down in the desert that is something else. It seemed to me the persons concerned were taking the vocabulary of one innocuous situation and applying it to another disasterous one. No way does anomaly apply to the photos I have seen.


You probably saw the press conference. With the exception of the people from Scaled, the rest of the people were just tools (Kern County Sheriff for one). They were probably mimicking what they heard earlier in the day, just like parrots!


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## pbehn (Nov 2, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> You probably saw the press conference. With the exception of the people from Scaled, the rest of the people were just tools (Kern County Sheriff for one). They were probably mimicking what they heard earlier in the day, just like parrots!



Nervous parrots ...words like break up, explosion, failure disintegration can lead to legal claims....lets just stick with a nice sounding anomaly and while we are a it re name ionising radiation as magic moonbeams. I dont mean any disrespect to the bereaved but the wording of these publicity releases sucks, the guys who died and were injured deserve better.


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 2, 2014)

pbehn said:


> Nervous parrots ...words like break up, explosion, failure disintegration can lead to legal claims....lets just stick with a nice sounding anomaly and while we are a it re name ionising radiation as magic moonbeams. I dont mean any disrespect to the bereaved but the wording of these publicity releases sucks, the guys who died and were injured deserve better.


I actually thought the same thing when I saw the first interviews. It seems the first responders were the first to speak, I don't know why this happened. I used to work at that airport, there's a lot of very talented and dedicated people there but there's also many who seem that they are more important than what they really are!

To be honest though, the woman in that article pisses me off more than the bobble heads. I bet she's never been to Scaled or anywhere near Mojave.


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## VBF-13 (Nov 2, 2014)

Siddley said:


> I took a look at their homepage and as soon as I read the words 'sustainable' and 'progressive' in their mission statement that told me everything I needed to know about them.
> They don't actually do anything, they just set themselves up with the aim of telling other people what to do...


People are going to remember this thing like they remember the Concorde. I know I wouldn't get on one even if it's biodegradable.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 2, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> To be honest though, the woman in that article pisses me off more than the bobble heads. I bet she's never been to Scaled or anywhere near Mojave.



Hell Joe, she isn't even talking about the same motor/propulsion fuel, that's how stupid she is.

As far her stating that she was trying to "warn" Virgin Galactic to the media after this recent tragedy, she is getting trashed by the public who seem to be better informed than she is. I just saw the article at Yahoo news that's using her claims as the anchor for their report and well over 75% of reader comments are lighting her up over her statements!

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## Torch (Nov 4, 2014)

The rockets and fuel tanks were found intact,possible pilot error activating a re-entry device...


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 4, 2014)

VBF-13 said:


> People are going to remember this thing like they remember the Concorde. I know I wouldn't get on one even if it's biodegradable.



I've spent many hours at Scaled Composites and seen some of the wonderful toys they have come up with. Innovative but very safe in their approach, I'd fly in that aircraft in a New York minute!


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## GrauGeist (Nov 4, 2014)

It looks like the NTSB has preliminary findings that the re-entry apparatus malfunctioned and deployed prematurely, causing the catastrophic failure of the vehicle.

I'll have to refind the link.


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 4, 2014)

GrauGeist said:


> It looks like the NTSB has preliminary findings that the re-entry apparatus malfunctioned and deployed prematurely, causing the catastrophic failure of the vehicle.
> 
> I'll have to refind the link.



Yep! I seen one report where they said the co-pilot might have deployed it.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 4, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Yep! I seen one report where they said the co-pilot might have deployed it.



Right, though they aren't still quite sure why he was activating it below Mach 1.4 and at the same time being still in the heavier atmosphere...

Found the link again, here: NTSB Discovers Uncommanded Feather Deployment In SpaceShipTwo Crash | AWIN ONLY content from Aviation Week


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 4, 2014)

Once the surviving pilot is out of intensive care, I'm sure we're going to quickly find out what happened.


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## VBF-13 (Nov 4, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> I've spent many hours at Scaled Composites and seen some of the wonderful toys they have come up with. Innovative but very safe in their approach, I'd fly in that aircraft in a New York minute!


I heard these have to reach Mach 12 just to get up into space. I'll consider going up in one when NASA considers insuring astronauts. It's the fuel that has me shaking like a leaf, not the craft.


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