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Subject:RE: OT: The Columbia From:"Sharon Burton-Hardin" <sharon -at- anthrobytes -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Mon, 3 Feb 2003 07:18:11 -0800
Missing tiles/some damage to the heat shields, within certain parameters,
should not prevent these machines from landing. I believe Columbia lost a
lot of tiles on her first trip. She did fine. They are designed to fail.
Besides, if the engineers thought the heat shield was OK for reentry, why
give it a second thought? All the astronauts would go up today, right now,
even not knowing what happened. Remember, lot of this going into space stuff
is based on best guesses. We keep doing stuff we have never done before. So
people analyze, model and then make their best guess about what is true. The
amazing thing is how often our best guess works!
My point is, this in an inherently dangerous thing to do. And those who do
it, choose to do it. NASA will figure it out, fix it so that can't or
shouldn't happen again, and we all go on. Deeply, tragically, sorry about
the losses, but tragically and bravely, all the people involved know this is
the price of participating in the biggest dream we humans have ever had. And
for them, this is worth it. Frankly, for me too. Hate losing the astronauts
and the ships though. Hurts my heart.
-----Original Message-----
From: bounce-techwr-l-71429 -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
[mailto:bounce-techwr-l-71429 -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com]On Behalf Of David
Downing
Sent: Monday, February 03, 2003 6:20 AM
To: TECHWR-L
Subject: RE: OT: The Columbia
I understand there was an internal memo stating that some damage had
been done to the heat shield during takeoff, and that said damage could
cause problem. Still, if the crew of the Columbia had been told, what
could they have done? I understand that there's no other alternate
procedure for re-entry.
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