[ale] OT: Space Shuttle Columbia

[Chuck Huber]

On Tue, Feb 04, 2003 at 06:26:35PM -0500, Matt Smith wrote:
> Certainly, better precautions for this type of thing could have taken place,
> but who would have known??  Exactly what happened this time (insulation
> breaking off/hitting) had happened before with no problems.  Without a
> reasonably safe means for inspecting for possible damage, what where they to
> do?

They still couldn't have done anything about it even if they had discovered
damage.

A more likely scenario would have been an in-orbit impact with space
jumk.  there' tens of thousands of objects in low earth orbit, some of
which is debris from collisions.  Perhaps it hit a piece of insulation
zipping by at the modest rate of 7 miles per second.  There's just so
much of it out there that can't be tracked.

Enjoy,
    - Chuck

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