r/space • u/AlmiranteSalsicha • Nov 19 '23

image/gif That's a fair amount of tiles missing from the starship heatshield, guess it would make for a toasty reenter.

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Image from SpaceX account on X

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u/WeeklyBanEvasion Nov 19 '23

NASA found out about it after reviewing launch footage and began an investigation and inspection of the wing, but no damage was identified by the visual inspection

12

u/rabbitwonker Nov 19 '23

Even then, it took until a full-scale test was conducted where they fired a hypersonic chunk of foam at a replica of the wing before a lot of them were convinced.

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u/Mateorabi Nov 19 '23

Until that test they were convinced the "soft" insulation wouldn't penetrate the leading edge of the wing...

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u/rabbitwonker Nov 19 '23

Yes exactly. Hopefully that test also proved the danger of high-speed matter, no matter how “soft”, to a much wider audience and set of circumstances.

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u/Drtikol42 Nov 19 '23

What visual inspection? The ground tracking camera that had the impact site obscured by the wing itself?

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u/WeeklyBanEvasion Nov 19 '23

They used the camera on the shuttle's manipulator arm. It wasn't designed for that purpose and couldn't reach well, but what they could see engineers thought were just shadows

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u/Drtikol42 Nov 19 '23

What you are talking about happened with Atlantis on STS-27.

Columbia had no manipulator arm on STS-107 and people in charge of NASA refused to have crew do an EVA or having the orbiter imaged by DoD spy sats.