Morgans wrote
A great example of this is when the space shuttle lands, particularly at
Edwards (at KSC it tends to be humid so water vapor forms in the
vortices
and masks the refraction). I've noticed it a few times and it is mainly
visible in video pointed right down the runway. Super high wing loading,
I
would guess.

I had always thought that was mainly due to the fact that the air coming
off
the bottom of the wing was hot as **** from re-entry. Perhaps some of
both?
--
Jim in NC


The effect only seems to be visible where the wingtip vortices would be, so
my guess would be that it's at least mostly due to them. As for the tiles
being as hot as ****, I don't think it's unusual for the ground support guys
and even the crew to wander around the shuttle not long after landing, even
touching the tiles, so I doubt they're still too hot. The tiles work by
storing the energy of re-entry within the material without raising their
temperatures too much. At the aerodynamic surface of the tiles the
temperature does get up into the thousands of degrees due to the shock
heating, but by the time the shuttle touches down they've likely cooled to
somewhat just cooler than ****.

But those are just my thoughts and possible unreliable memories of photos
and video. I hope someone corrects me if I'm wrong.


-Tony "I'm not an aerospace engineer yet but I play one on TV" Goetz