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Want to look in the Discovery?


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*looks at all the controls*

No matter how much training NASA could give me,

I would never be able to fly that thing.

Looked pretty reasonable to me, until I saw the overhead switch panel. ??? Snap your neck just trying to SEE half those switches.

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*looks at all the controls*

No matter how much training NASA could give me,

I would never be able to fly that thing.

That's why most of the control is done in Houston by all those guys sitting around in the mission control room. The Astronauts are just, 'Spam in a Can' but know enough to do what they have to when the crap hits the fan.

What I find amazing is the ancient computers controlling the flight surfaces with their inbuilt redundancy. There are 4 online, 3 look at the commands they receive and then vote on carrying them out. If they argue on the commands (corrupt) they decide who is wrong and bring the 4th one online to take over from the busted one. Then if that still fails and they disagree on the commands they notify the crew who can bring a 5th (offline) system online to assist. This prevents a rouge computer from issuing a command that would cause the shuttle to spiral out of control and crash.

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What I find amazing is the ancient computers controlling the flight surfaces with their inbuilt redundancy. There are 4 online, 3 look at the commands they receive and then vote on carrying them out. If they argue on the commands (corrupt) they decide who is wrong and bring the 4th one online to take over from the busted one. Then if that still fails and they disagree on the commands they notify the crew who can bring a 5th (offline) system online to assist. This prevents a rouge computer from issuing a command that would cause the shuttle to spiral out of control and crash.

We're looking at you, Hal-9000 >:(

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Kronos: In fact, you COULD fly it if you were trained to do so. True, there are a lot of gauges and switches (and here is a place where you can see that despite all the work that has been done on it, the Shuttle remains a 1970s spacecraft! Modern designs have far more ergonomically designed controls), but remember - the crew are using only one at a time. Many of those controls and gauges will only be used once in a flight, or only be relevant during an emergency, or only come on line when a particular payload is being carried etc etc etc.

The stuff that is actually needed to land the shuttle, for example, involves the pedals, the stick and the screens (if memory serves, in the last ten years it may even have been possible to land the thing using only the heads-up display, meaning you wouldn't even have to look at the screens!).

And yes, it is complicated. But to match that, the NASA training regimen is unbelievable. Don't worry, you'd be ready. :)

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