Replies to post #71458 on Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[sylvester80]

<It's always a little scary to me when NASA folks start talking about what they feel is safe.>

Exactly! Seems to me that someone lost track of what engineering is all about. Especially aerospace engineering. IMO, they should have used every resource possible to them (and they have many) to try and determine the exact damage of the shuttle's underbelly. They made a lot of assumptions and that's a sure way to end up falling flat on your face. Whomever made the decision to let the shuttle return without having complete data has a lot of explaining to do IMO. And saying that they could not repair the shuttle in space is not enough either. They could have sent another shuttle up for a rescue mission to at least pick up the crew and then figure out how to salvage the shuttle by fixing the damage. Assuming it will be OK for reentry was the wrong decision that was made with limited information.

Of course that's all in hind sight... sad indeed...

[sylvester80]

<In the spy satellite photos of previous shuttle missions, how much detail were they able to get?>

The thing that upsets me the most is that they didn't even try to take a spy satellite photo. They just again "assumed" it would not be useful.