Free Republic

NACOGDOCHES, Texas –– Searchers found the front of the space shuttle Columbia's nose cone buried deep in the ground near the Louisiana border, officials said Monday night. "It's reasonably intact," said Warren Zahner, a senior coordinator for the Environmental Protection Agency, which is overseeing collection of shuttle debris . Other officials said the nose cone was burrowed deep in the ground. A crew was to return to the site about three miles west of Hemphill, near the Louisiana border, on Tuesday to excavate the nose cone. The shuttle broke up 39 miles over Texas and fell to Earth as it...

In recent days the popular media has been focusing their attention on an impact event during the launch of STS-107. The impact of External Tank insulation and/or ice with the Orbiter during ascent was initially judged by NASA to be unlikely to cause loss of the vehicle. Obviously, loss of the integrity of the orbiter Thermal Protection System occured in some manner. When Freepers posted the reports of these impacts on the site, I initially discounted the hypothesis. Orbiters had sustained multiple impacts in the past. However, the size of the plume in the last photo gives me pause. I'd...