Quote:
Originally posted by LubeMaster77
Saw one launch in the early 90's. Amazing stuff. I do remeber seeing two different contrails - one was the typical white smoke that drifted and dissipated and the other was a darker, faint grey that was pin straight. I always wondered if the darker one was an ion stream or something. The white was most likely steam and CO/CO2? Any ideas?
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I think one stream (the "dirtier" one) is the SRB exhaust and the other is the SSME exhaust. The SSMEs are running on hydrogen/oxygen and the SRBs use that nasty solid fuel...
I saw a launch in 2000 from the VIP viewing stands (closest you can get, IIRC). It was so loud it made my t-shirt visibly vibrate.
Mike