It's all flight computer control at the time of the breakup.  The pilot's
in control for landing, not reentry.

-Charlie
On Mon, Feb 03, 2003 at 01:03:58AM +1100, Roman Black wrote:
> Russell McMahon wrote:
>
> > Background:     Best bet at present (which may well prove to be wrong) seems
> > to be that a piece of debri (ice? insulation?) off the main tank which was
> > known to have struck the left wing during ascent, caused structural damage
> > or damage to insulating tiles.
>
>
> This is indeed a sad day, such tragic loss of life, face
> and probably impetus of the space program. :o(
>
> I do question your best bet (above), as i'm thinking the
> insulation incident may be a red herring. I have a bad
> feeling about the age of the shuttle, coupled with an
> inexperienced crew. Minutes before the breakup the
> shuttle performed a high wing-stress roll manuever,
> *possibly* at a few too many degrees rotation, and this
> was right at the max heat/stress point of re-entry or
> very close to it. An already ageing air frame, and some
> tiny crew errors near the point of max re-entry stresses
> would do it. Until they have the facts maybe it's easier
> or safer just to blame a piece of foam but I won't be
> surprised of it turns out to be worse news than that.
>
> My sympathy goes to the ground crew. The voice comms on
> the shuttle are modular and reliable, and i'm sure the
> ground crew got to listen to a few seconds of some very
> horrifying stuff before it did go dead. Yes the public
> don't really need to know this and are probably best
> fed the sanitised version of events. I just hope the
> great people in the program keep their nerve and never
> turn away from man's expansion outward into the universe.
> After all, how many died at sea during the exploration
> of the globe?
> -Roman
>
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--
Charles Anderson        caa@columbus.rr.com

No quote, no nothin'

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