Talk:Teleoperator Retrieval System

Proposed write up

<Below is a proposed write up for the Teleoperator Retrieval System (TRS), written by Michael Leeds. I was a Propulsion Engineer who worked on the Project for Martin Marietta at the time the heroic effort was made to rescue the falling Skylab.>

In October 1977, Martin Marietta was awarded a two-year contract by the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) for an emergency build of the Teleoperator Retrieval System (TRS) tasked to rescue the falling Skylab. The Skylab, launched on 5/14/73, had successfully served three different manned crews over its first eight months, but had remained vacant since the last crew departed on 2/8/74. In late 1976, during studies aimed at reactivating manned operations, it became all too clear that unless something extraordinary was done within the next couple of years, the Skylab was going to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere and either burn up or crash onto the Earth’s surface. An additional concern worried NASA, namely the presence of a nuclear power source onboard the Skylab. NASA formulated a plan to have a TRS designed and built in an unprecedented two-year period, and have it ready for launch by late 1979 onboard the first planned launch of the new Space Transportation System (STS) Space Shuttle. A team of approximately 400 engineers at Martin Marietta in Denver, CO began working almost around the clock to design a core TRS Module that heavily leveraged existing hardware, wherever possible, to try and shorten the build time consistent with that required for the proposed rescue mission. As the team labored, a steady stream of bad news continued to flow in – the projected Space Shuttle launch date was slipping badly. The TRS Module Propulsion design consisted of a single cylindrical, titanium tank, containing 1,500 lbm of hydrazine propellant, with a cluster of eight 40 lbf monopropellant thrusters attached to the aft end of the support structure. The thrusters were actually already built for another program and never used, so they provided significant cost savings and more importantly, a huge schedule reduction over a new procurement. The full TRS design for launch required four of these Modules closely coupled together to form a square, holding the 6,000 lbm of hydrazine necessary to re-boost Skylab to the required orbit. In mid-December of 1978, about two weeks from Christmas, MSFC issued a cancellation of the TRS Contract when the latest update on the Space Shuttle revealed the projected demise date for Skylab was now well beyond the new projected launch date for STS-1. As events unfolded, the Skylab crashed to Earth on 7/11/79, almost two years before the actual STS-1 launch on 4/12/81. A classic case of too little, too late! It was a sad time for me and the other 400 engineers on the Project as we had become personally attached to this little tug that could…but wouldn’t get the chance.

71.114.233.86 (talk) 20:47, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

Wonderful to hear from someone who worked on the project! This write-up would certainly flesh out the article a bit more, so I would love to add these details. Can you help out with sources for the facts? Richardneish (talk) 12:49, 15 July 2014 (UTC)